Sapporo Snow Festival

Unfortunately I could not stay for the festival. The price for accommodation increased 3 fold at least over the few days that the festival was open and Sapporo expected to receive about 1.5 - 2 million visitors over those few days. Therefore we didn't want to be there at that time fighting over viewing space with those other people. Lucky for us most of the structures were complete (something that we were banking on) and we could look at them from close up the night before the opening. Most weren't lit up but that was fine. Its amazing to see what people can create from ice and snow.

The design process

Actual work in progress - final touch ups before the unveiling

Ice House Replica
Mickey and Friends, about 20m high
Smaller sculpture from a movie last year (1m)
The biggest structure there. A replica of a German building (30-40m tall) almost as big as the surrounding buildings.

The gang's big day out

Having been released from the prison that is University there was no lake we wouldn't cross and no mountain that we wouldn't climb to feel that sense of freedom. Due to it being freezing cold we didn't have to swim any lakes but could rather walk on them and we didn't have to climb mountains but get pulled to the top by a snowcat. But still, it is the freedom that counts ^^

Skating for the first timeSnow covered bikes
The escapees
The snowcat
Sapporo in the dark from the mountain

Not really a mountain, probably a large hill but it was still 531.03m above sea level. It was very cold and VERY VERY VERY windy up there.

Sapporo City

The sights of Sapporo were quite amazing. It is Japan's 5th largest city and has developed into a modern metropolis very quickly. The city was built with the American Blocks system so most of the streets are in order from 1 to ... and East and West of the center where the Snow Festival was held.

Sapporo Park Hotel - From the front

View out of the window of my room

The mountains in the background - view from window of room

At the Cookie Factory we had a light lunch. It was beautiful, both the lunch and the sights

The main entertainment area of Sapporo which also included the more scummy parts of society...

... including a "Soap Land"Soapland is, and I quote "(ソープランド, sōpurando^?) is a type of brothel in Japan where male clients can engage in sexual activity with female prostitutes, although officially the clubs do business as places where the client is bathed. There are also a few soaplands specifically for female clients."

Sapporo Trip

The gaijingang (foreigner gang) decided to head off to the lovely city of Sapporo in Hokkaido (click "Sapporo" for a link, the northern most city on this map). After 1hr and 30 mins of flying we landed at Sapporo and headed off to hotel Sapporo Park Hotel. It was one fancy hotel, surely a 4* rating by the look of the lobby and the prices in the restaurants alone. We had managed to get a return flight and 3 nights at the hotel for 30000 Yen which was very reasonable considering it was just before the Sapporo Snow Festival.

With the temperature being -15C we didn't want to be outside for most of the time so we had several tours of the sights in Sapporo. The Beer Factory and Cookie Factory being 2 of the places we visited. At both of these places we indulged ourselves in their sample products!

The Sapporo Beer Factory started in 1876 after a Japanese Beer maker went to Germany to learn the trade.
Beers from the late 1800s

The Beer samples. The one on the left was the tastiest, aka Sapporo Classic. The black beer was to rich for my liking.The Shiroikoibito cookie factory (The white lovers/sweethearts cookie factory)

We returned to the Sapporo Beer Factory for a 2nd time to eat some of the famous Genghis Khan style all you can eat meal. This was delicious and we ate plates and plates of lamb and vegetables for 100 minutes. It was great fun and we all stuffed our faces for all of the time that was made available to us.

The Sapporo Bear outside the restaurant. Before and After scultping

JeongJu and Gavin cooking the meat.
The mess left by 11 foreigners after the 100 minutes were up