To Sapporo

Very excited (before we left)

So, a short entry.  We have made it to Sapporo safe and well.  We actually had two very good flights (business class makes all the difference) in fact I was sad when the first flight finished as I would have happily have stayed on it for a couple more hours.  The beds went down proper flat and you got a duvet.  Problem was that it was too early to get any sleep.  The flight landed in Hong Kong at 11pm UK time so of course we were just getting tired when it started to descend.  Oh hum.

We had an hour in Hong Kong before catching our connecting flight to Sapporo.  Funny on the Hong Kong flight business class was about 50% Asian 50% White.  We were the only white family on the way to Sapporo and the only white family in Sapporo Airport when we landed - it was certainly landing time for flights from China.  Not a problem though, think we all quite like being novelties.  Now of course we were very tired, but it was a day time flight - leaving Hong Kong at 8am and arriving in Sapporo at 2pm.  We had wide seats, but they didn't turn into beds, because it was a daytime flight.  Poo.  Managed to snatch the odd 10 minutes here and there, but it wasn't great.

Sunrise over China

Landed in Sapporo airport to be greeted with a street of life size Steiff cuddly toys: elephants, giraffes, orang-utans, polar bears - you name it, it was there.  Looking at the shops etc in the airport, I think the actual airport is a destination in itself to go to for the day - there is actually a chocolate factory and a hot springs in the airport somewhere too that we know about...



We got the Rapid Service train into Sapporo and found our flat with not too much bother - exactly 1km walk from the main station which is very handy.  It's not the most modern of flats, but it will do us fine.  We are having to do the usual of putting Tom to bed in our bed to sleep and then lift him onto the sofa bed when we go to bed (we did actually find an apartment with 2 actual bedrooms when we originally booked our accommodation but since then the Japanese government have pretty much banned AirBnB, meaning we had to take what we could find.  It's not a bad place, as I said well located and with all the bits and bobs we need.  (I don't intend to cook, so really all we need to do is sleep, have access to Wifi and a bathroom)

Taiwan from above

So we had a shower and went down to the station in search of food and ended up in a tonkatsu restaurant, very nice it was too.  One thing though, the cutlery they provide for children is now too small for Tom's massive appetite and of course he still can't use chopsticks.  We will have to see if we can find some 'cheats' chopsticks in a 100 yen shop he can have instead.  We have tried to teach him how to use chopsticks, but it is really difficult and also me being left handed doesn't exactly help.  We will see what happens this holiday...

Oh and the weather in Manchester was cloudy and rainy.  The weather in Hong Kong was cloudy and rainy and the weather in Sapporo...cloudy and rainy.  Humph!!!!!!!