Sapporo 🚘 Otaru (& 🍈🍈🍈)
Kamala
Mäneka and I both slept rather fitfully on Monday night. Perhaps it was the echoing joy of our first Cremia, our irregular bathroom schedules, that the pillows at our last hotel were particularly hard, or that we had some underlying sense of the anxiety that lay ahead for what would be our first family driving experience in Japan.
Some signs that portended less than ideal conditions:
- Balaram’s CA driver’s license, an integral part to his international driver’s license, was missing
- So it would be entirely on Linda to manage driving on the left side of the road, and she’s not known to take on new challenges without panic
- It was unclear whether or not we had reserved an automatic car
- It was unclear whether or not we had built-in navigation and whether it would be in English
- We thought we had an idea of how electronic tolls were paid, but we, in fact, knew nothing
However, Mäneka and Balaram had been very enchanted after reading about a special melon farm a few hours outside of Sapporo, and we would not be thwarted. After our usual breakfasts, we wheeled our suitcases down the street to the Toyota Rent a car shop, where we picked up our hatchback 4x4 Japanese Corolla — basically the gay cousin of the sedate American Corolla sedan.
It also turned out the car had built-in GPS, so we set our destination to the Farm Tomita, and Linda began to gingerly weave her way toward the Hokkaido toll road. “Turn into the far lane, and keep in mind you’re very close to driving off the edge of the road,” Mäneka offered very practical advice and navigational support from the front seat.
Our biggest challenge came when we entered the toll station in an electronic toll pass lane, but despite the series of beeps we heard and thought were reassuring, could not get the short gate to open in front of us. A giant Chuo Bus loomed behind us, implicitly breathing down Linda’s neck and pushed its WiFi network into the car, so that when a voice on the load-speaker began to ask Linda questions in Japanese, she began frantically looking right and left. When the voice did not get the answers it needed, a nice man appeared beside our car with a non-electronic toll card and a piece of paper in English telling us to use our ETC card to pay when we exited the toll road, or just pay in cash.
As Linda puffed out her cheeks and drove away, we discussed the endless and infinite number of possible reasons the ETC card had been missing from the toll device in our car, and where things had gotten mixed up. We paid some enormous tolls, but did drive through gorgeous farmland and rice paddies, framed by snowy mountains, and arrived without incident at the Tomita Melon House.
Mäneka’s face lit up immediately upon stepping outside and pure joy continued to radiate from her as we assessed the melon counter, a place where you can buy a guaranteed excellent slice of precut melon on its rind for 350¥. The little boat of melon was as perfect as one might expect, perfectly sweet and refreshing.
But the main event was the soft serve. So after checking out the Bread & Cake shack, where dad got a melon-cream filled bun, Mäneka and I each got a red melon (essentially a cantaloupe) cone and proceeded to eat some of the most delicate and smooth soft serve of our lives. Linda joined in with a melon/milk twist parfait with chunks of melon. Everyone was impressed, but Mäneka was in heaven.
From there we moved to Farm Tomita, the lavender Farm, where they made it clear they wanted to no part in our melon fun. That said, we wandered through some beautiful fields of poppies, lavender, and lupin, and marveled at all of the goods they managed to insert lavender scent or flavor into — from the obvious soft serve to the less obvious scented pen. One of the coolest things we saw were hanging plant sculptures made with gourds, dried lotus heads and flowers, and handfuls of moss. Whenever we see a cool, well-arranged piece of decor, we always think of our very design-inclined and adept cousin Masami and say “Take a photo, I bet Masami can make that,” so we did.
Balaram
BP and LO got up early and went for a walk around the hotel, attempting to go to Odori Park which is actually east of the hotel but we walked north. It was interesting anyway as we saw more shops and stores including curry soup places. Interesting that Mister Donut and a boulangerie were not open at 9 AM.
We had breakfast at Mister Donut again while Kamala and Maneka had items from Lawson. After picking up the rental car, we headed out to Farm Tomita. Linda got the hang of driving pretty quickly and we had a nice drive through the countryside arriving in the early afternoon. We immediately went to the main hall of Tomita Melon House where there were melons, both whole and sliced, and vegetables for sale. We walked around and went next to the bread/pastry stand and BP selected a pastry with a melon cream filling. It was ok. The pastry was a bit too sweet and the filling was good, but not enough in my opinion. The highlight was the soft serve ice cream which was very smooth, rich and flavorful. One of the best I’ve had.
We went next door to Farm Tomita, a separate business on whose walls were posted many signs prohibiting anything from Tomita Melon House being brought to Farm Tomita. There has to be an interesting story there.
The Farm is very pretty and maintained in Disney-type orderliness with purple-clad women working the fields, which made me think of Oompa Loompas. The Farm is known for growing lavender. They sell many lavender-flavored foods, including soft serve, Calpis, lemonade, and coffee.
On the way back to our car in the Melon lot, Kamala had a couple of slices of pizza from the small kiosk that proclaimed itself the Japan winner in 2016 and 2017 and a finalist in Parma in 2018. It smelled good and the crust was nice, but it could use a bit more salt as Kamala noted.
We then began the drive toward our next stop, Otaru, which required driving back toward Sapporo and then heading west to the coast. It was uneventful and, as often happens, seemed much shorter on the return. The Hotel Nord is across from the canals and not as nice as the Hotel Mercure or the Narita Nikko. For example, no changing sheets or cleaning unless we paid an extra ¥500/ day.
For dinner we went to a very nice sushi place nearby, Sushi Ko. Excellent rice, miso soup, ikura, and fish. Afterwards we stopped at a fish market that had a lot of the local catch, including many crab varieties. There was fruit/vegetable section with Furano melons and others fruits. We bought some very flavorful strawberries as a nice dessert to end a very enjoyable Tuesday.
