Fourteenth Week

Fourteenth Week

YUKI MATSURI

 Technically this will be my fourteenth week.  I just got back from visiting my family over the holiday break and had a few days of jet lag.  Luckily, I recovered from my jet lag before my schedule departure day for Sapporo, Hokkaido.  I went the week of the Snow Festival and it was really fun and with lots of snow.  I'd never seen snow before so I was very excited about the snow itself.

 The view from my hotel room.

 That snow is almost as tall as the taxi.

 My hotel room, it was smaller than hotel rooms in the states, but it was comfortable.

 I went early in the morning and took a look at the ice and snow sculptures in Odori.

 At first they were ice sculptures, really impressive detailing.

 This was bigger, you can't really tell from the photo but it was big.

 Now this one was made of snow and it was humongous.  But I mean enormous, really impressive

 Another snow one.

 The detailing is amazing.

 Back to ice.

 Back to snow

 I was so impressed by the big ones, and my hands were so cold, I took pictures of the big ones.  But there tons of smaller snow sculptures like this one.  Still pretty big, just small compared to the bigger ones.

 I had a coupon and ate at a restaurant at the Kirin Beer Hall for free.  I'm not entirely sure what this was, something mutton and the name in Japanese is something Kahn and it's not Genghis Kahn.  At least if it is Genghis Kahn, it's a pronunciation I'd never heard before. Only thing is I had to cook it myself in the middle of the table.  They also gave me some sauce, but I was totally lost.  I had no idea what I was supposed to do.

 The restaurant was really close to a park, and I was impressed by all the white.

 I would hate for one of those to be my bike.

 The snow reached up to my waist, I was really happy that I got to see so much snow.

 Too bad kids, playgrounds closed.

 A frozen river, it wasn't very big.

 But it fed to what I'm sure was a lake.  Couldn't really tell cause all of it was just snow.

 I wish I could say I made, I really do, but I just found walking through the park.  I did try to make one but I failed miserably.  A friend from Canada tells me that it was probably hard for me because the snow was dry snow (I'm pretty sure this one was the dry one, not the wet one.  She said it's good snow for skiing, not so good for trying to do a snowman.

 There was another section of the sculptures on another street.  This one was in Susukino.  All the ones here were ice sculptures.

 A bar of ice, hmm.  I don't think it's such a good idea.

 I think this was real seafood frozen in the ice.

 Yummy.

 This was a section of ice sculptures people could sit in and have their picture taken, with their own camera.

 These as well, but given their size I'm gonna take a wild guess and say they're meant for kids.

 The view from the top of Sapporo Television Tower.

 The snow festival from the top of Sapporo TV Tower.

 It was starting to get dark so they were lighting up the festival.

 Sapporo TV Tower.

They even had a Pikachu for Pokemon fans.