Instead of hanging around Sapporo, we took an early train over to Otaru to have a look around. Since it was early, we took the bus over to Shukutsu to look at the falling down "nishin goten" and the Aoyama Villa, before returning to Otaru checking out the tourist outlets such as "K's Blowing." Sarah & Drew took about 10 minutes to go through a mansion filled with artwork. We hiked up to the first shrine in Hokkaido, and then past some goten that turned into restaurants until we got to the Nishin Goten Museum under the Showa Lighthouse. We didn't visit the aquarium which seems to be the most popular spot for the Japanese.On returning to Otaru, our first stop after walking through the arcade was at the Kita-no-ice-cream-yasan, famous for strange flavoured ice creams. I got "uni" and "bara" (sea urchin and rose). Sarah got a "rose" single and whatever Drew wanted they were out so he got "sea urchin." We then walked down the old sea front street checking out the tourist shops until we found a small restaurant for lunch. Sarah spotted some strawberry-flavoured cigarettes on the way back to the station which she got just for fun. (In Kyoto she threw them away.)

Back in the Toyoko Inn in Sapporo, Drew and I were going up the small elevator to the room along with a small Japanese man. He looked up and freaked out. We had to show him where his room was and what floor to get off because the sight of two gaijin towering over him was just too much to take. We skipped the free dinner and watched some TV. Sarah came in and passed out from jet lag.