What a coincidence!

Day 24

4.15am alarm call. Early! We dragged ourselves out of bed and dressed coats on top of the pyjamas.

I had slept extremely well. Beds are comfortable. The bed's curtain dimmed the lights just enough, like at the capsule hotel in Tokyo. No sounds could be heard, all was very quiet.

Up to the upper deck we went. We weren't sure if the doors to the upper deck would be open but they were. On the way we found a familiar face. Do you believe we found the japanese that 2 days earlier at the pub was speaking a mix of spanish, portuguese and italian? He was seating at a chair near the window. I looked at him and his face was familiar, he looked at me and he seem to recognize me as well. Suddenly he said 'Portugal!' and we recognized each other. What a coincidence!

He had been sleeping since he boarded at Sendai and had missed dinner. He was now extremely hungry and waiting for the breakfast room to open at 7am. Oh boy, another 2.5h of waiting! We told him we wanted to see the sunrise. He said we were too early but his window was facing west and the sun rises east.

As soon as we walked out of the door the wind and the cold hit us. I suddenly though how bad being a fisherman must be. What about a fisherman in Alasca? Tough job! We didn't wait long for the sun. It came out rather quickly, first just a line and than a ball of fire. Red, orange, yellow. An explosion of colour, ripping the dark sky and making it lighter and blue. The sun went up very quickly, almost a blink of an eye. Before we notice it was hiding behind the clouds, we had just a few minutes but it was enough. We saw the sunrise on the land of the rising sun!

The boys were still sleepy and without wifi I had nothing to do so we went straight to bed again and slept a bit longer. We woke up near 8.30am and quickly went to the breakfast room to have breakfast before it closed at 9am. For ¥1000 you have a fairly basic buffet. Food isn't spectacular, variety isn't much but it is enough to fill you up. We were the last ones to eat and doors were closed after us.

There was a show at 9.30am so we stayed to watch. Our friend had told us it was worth it and we were curious to see what kind of show could be offered in 30min (9.30-10am). We were surprised to see two old ladies, a piano and a xylophone. They both played both instruments, sometimes one in each sometimes both at the xylophone. We were even more surprised to hear how good they were. Fantastic ladies I must say! They played really well, both instruments!

After the show a middle aged man approached us and started chating. The usual questions. He is retired and currently a farmer. He's a vegetarian so he grows vegetables for himself. He looked young and healthy. I wonder if I'll look this good when I (eventually? maybe?) retire.

We lounged around for a while as we had a little time before arrival at 11am. There were a lot of men in this ferry and very little women. Some of these men had a weird look, I was given a couple of pervert looks when I was wearing a top with a (very healthy) cleavage the night before. We were the only foreigners.

We found the man from the pub again exiting the ferry and realized he was heading the same way as us. Well, actually, he was going one train stop ahead. He was very chatty and nice so we decided to stick with him as he knew the way better.

We took the bus from the ferry port to the train station in Tomakomei. There aren't many rapid trains, only 14 a day, and we just missed the previous one. So instead of waiting for the next one, we took the local train.

Hokkaido is different from the rest of Japan in many ways. Starting with the local trains. The train had 1 car. You read right: 1 only car. It was full on the first stop! The speed however was hilarious. About 3-4km/h. Slow, really slow. It was about the same speed as a horse powered tram. It took almost an hour, double of the time of the rapid train.  However it gave us the opportunity to observe the scenery.

It looks like spring hasn't arrived yet. Trees have naked branches, no flowers anywhere and there are bits of snow here and there. It's cooler than in Sendai and it did not stop raining. Houses are also different. There aren't any typical japanese houses like we have seen in the rest of Japan but that doesn't come as a surprise when you learn that Hokkaido has only been colonized by the dominant japanese population in the last 150 years. Houses are quite modern looking, the majority not very pretty, some of them look prefabricated.

We sat with our new japanese friend and managed to learn that he is a tour guide and lived in Rome. That explains the knowledge of languages.

Noboribetsu was our destination but we got to the Noboribetsu city and we were heading to Noboribetsu Onsen, the most famous onsen in Hokkaido. We left the train and said goodbye. There is a bus from the train station straight to the onsen in 15min. We weren't the only ones going, the bus was packed with people and bags. I had to leave my backpack in the middle of the corridor as I couldn't move anywhere amidst all the luggage.

Noboribetsu onsen is a small village in the mountain. The smell hits you as soon as you get out of the bus. Sulphur again.

We relaxed a bit at the hotel before braving the rain outside. It kept raining but we had sightseeing to do and rain doesn't stop me. The amount of time required to visit the local Jigokudani (Hell Valley) and Oyunuma lake was difficult to ascertain pre-hand. There was contradictory information on the internet. Some said 15-30min, others up to 3h! We took the umbrellas from the hotel (hotels have umbrellas for the use of clients at the entrance door) and prepared to get seriously wet.

There are several pedestrian routes and they all criss-cross so it is easy not to miss anything. There was some snow deposits on the side of the road, which is unbelievable when you consider how warm it was.

Oyunuma lake (1km round gourd-shaped pond of hot spring) and Mount Hiyori (337m smoky vulcano), with sulphur water coming out at 130 Celsius and the dusty black surface ranging from 40-50 Celsius. Isn't it beautiful?

Jigoku-Dani (Hell Valley) is 450m in diameter and 11ha in area whith many geisers. It is an impressive and sterile place.

We decided not to go down the hot water river up to the natural foot spa. No way we would be sitting on the rain and getting our bums wet. Feedback from it seems to be good so maybe next time.

The walk was done under poring rain. Even with the umbrellas and jackets, we were properly soaked to the bones. Dripping the floor of the hotel, we went up to our room, changed to yukatas and went to the onsen to warm up.

This one was a big onsen. Indoor it had a huge central circular bath (salt bath), 4 corner baths around (salt, iron, sulphur and cold bath) and a sauna. Sauna was at 90 Celsius, I managed to survive for 4 min and left fairly quickly. The circular bath was good to walk around, unfortunately it didn't had the statue of ladies like advertised in the hotel's website, The baths are all of transparent water, apart from the sulphur bath which is milky white. Outside there were 2 baths, one with warm water and made of wood and one of stone with sulphur water. Outside space wasn't spectacular but it was relaxing. I assume it's on the men's onsen that the good stuff is.

Air temperature was cold and when you are wet and naked, you can really feel it. So going through the outside door and stepping into the warm water was done in a rushed, quick and swift movement. You can't feel the cold when you are inside, it feels really good!

Check out the onsen's pictures:

http://www.nobogura.co.jp/hotspring/rome.html

http://www.nobogura.co.jp/hotspring/openair.html

Clean and warm, we headed to the dining hall. It is big and the amount of food available was huge. It was a buffet, but a good one. There was a chef doing sashimi on demand, another doing sushi on demand, another doing noodles on demand, fruit, deserts, plenty of other japanese and western food and even snow crab. Crab is a specialty of Hokkaido and it was so well presented/prepared that it took me barely no time to scrub all the meat out of it.

What a fantastic dinner! We truly recommend! The downside of this amazing buffets is that you always overeat and end up fat and sleepy.