Alvinology goes to Japan – Day 13 of 14

All good things must come to an end. This was the second last day of our Japan trip. There’s so much more we wanted to see, yet so little time. Sigh.

We rented a Toyota BB for our remaining two days so we can travel further and visit more places. It also makes economical sense to drive ourselves to the airport on the last day rather than cab which cost a bomb in Japan.

We woke up relatively early that day and headed for the Akashi-Kaikyō Bridge (明石海峡大橋) upon collecting our car.

The Akashi-Kaikyō Bridge also known as the Pearl Bridge and is the world’s longest suspension bridge (measured by the length of the center span of 1,991 metres/6,532 feet/1.24 miles). The bridge links the city of Kobe on the mainland of Honshū to Iwaya on Awaji Island by crossing the busy Akashi Strait. It carries part of the Honshū-Shikoku Highway.

On our way there, we had brunch at a cafeteria at a nearby rest stop. The food was good and cheap. I presume it’s liken to our “mixed food stalls (杂菜饭)” or “economic rice stalls (经济菜饭)” in Singapore. I also tried the Japanese McDonald’s Quarter Pounder which according to Mark, had beef patties that tasted much juicier than the ones in Singapore. It was a lie… the patties tasted the same to me. Mark is just being biased towards all things Japan as usual.

After brunch, we did a bit of light shopping at a large suburban mall, located next to the rest stop.

We had a lot of fun at the Akashi-Kaikyō Bridge. There are observation platforms for us to walk on part of the bridge to experience the strong wind and marvel at the engineering. Mark and I were quite wary of the transparent glass tiles on the platforms which felt like stepping on air when you are standing on them. The ladies had more fun with it than us as we were experiencing “jelly feet”.

Later in the day, we headed back to Mt. Rokkō (六甲山) and visited the Kobe City Rokkosan Pasture. We got to play with sheep there and also checked out the Kobe Cheese House which had many exhibits and demonstrations on how cheese is made. It was a pity there was a very strong wind blowing that day and we weren’t unable to properly visit the entire pasture. The rain, the wind and the bitter coldness almost killed us as we tried to make our way to some of the attractions situated at far flung locations at the top of the hills. It was so bad that our umbrellas were damaged and we could feel the wind resistance pushing us backwards as we trouped back to our car.

We headed back to Harborland for our last bit of shopping after that. Mark then made all of us accompany him via train to another station because he felt like eating something special for the last day and was not impressed by the restaurant choices at Harborland. Rachel and I had sashimi dons for our last dinner in Japan. The restaurant we found was very popular and we had to queue for quite a while to get in. It was worth it for the price and quality. Mark and Meiyen went to try out the beef don which Rachel and I were very impressed with during our visit to the area two days ago. They liked it too.

The four of us then had gyoza for a after-dinner snack. The interesting thing is, we were not allowed to sit in the restaurant as we did not order any alcholic beverages – that was the house rule in the gyoza specialty restaurant. Apparently, the Japanese only eats gyoza together with alcohol?

We had Haagen-Dazs ice cream for dessert. The price is surprisingly cheaper in Japan than Singapore despite the lousy exchange rates. They also have more flavours on offer.

After that, we went back to Harborland to retrieve our car and headed back to our hotel to tuck in for the night. Tomorrow, we will be leaving Japan and returning back to sunny Singapore. Oh… and as per our previous days’ tradition, we had supper at our hotel meal area, feasting on food we swept up at the supermarkets. Mark bought a set of yakitori which he was very eager to try. However, he never got to taste them as he stupidly place the yakitori into the microwave to reheat together with the plastic container. In the end, the plastic melted and stuck to his yakitori.

Links to my previous blog entries on my Japan  trip:

Day 1 – Kansai Airport, Hokkaido

Day 2 – Skiing, Otaru

Day 3 – Asahikawa, Asahiyama Zoo

Day 4 – Sledding, Shiroi Koibito, Crab Buffet

Day 5 – The 60th Sapporo Snow Festival

Day 6 – Staying with the Asai, Shōnan

Day 7 – Ueno, Tokyo

Day 8 – Shibuya and Akihabara, Tokyo

Day 9 – Ikeda, Osaka

Day 10 – Kobe

Day 11 – Kyoto

Day 12 – Osaka Aquarium Kaiyukan and Dotonbori

Day 13 – Akashi-Kaikyo Bridge and Mt. Rokko

Day 14 – Return to Singapore

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