Day 31 - 12 Aug - Hakodate, Japan

We arrived promptly by 9am and were tied up at the pier. Wait a minute, this doesn't look anything like the pier that Lance presented in his port talk! And there were shuttle buses waiting to take us into the city. As we departed the ship I inquired of Florin (Hotel Director) about the docking change and mentioned it was different than what Lance presented us. It then took a few minutes to get oriented to the new port location. Having a mapping app on my phone helped (Maps.me). The impeccable shuttle took us about 20 minutes downtown to the JR train station and bus depot which is in the heart of the city and near a few high value tourist attractions.

When we got off the bus, Gary and Marty approached us and asked if they could tag along. We've traveled with them before and they are super people. We conferred with a local high school student who was there as a guide and learned where the Morning Market was located. We had considered taking the tram out to the National Park to see the monkeys bathing in the hot springs. But another guest alerted us that it's really only in the winter that they do that. So our plan for today was to visit the Morning Market, Goryokakucho Fort, possibly the Goryokakucho Tower, and a student craft display. With our early departure announced yesterday, that seemed like a reasonable plan.

We strolled through the market and this was clearly the most congenial market we have ever visited. The vendors were happy to share their wares and there were many samples. There was all manner of fish and fish related items along with dry goods. One could jig for squid and the catch could be immediately cooked. There were lots of live crabs, cooked crabs, ice cream vendors and much more. It was total shopping overload and since it was a Japanese holiday, it was a bit crowded. We even bought some dried haddock that is yummy. And there were Welcome Maasdam signs throughout the market. They truly appreciated we were here.

When we were through walking the Morning Market, we walked back to the shuttle bus drop off area and consulted with one of the high school girls one which tram to take and where was it located. With that instruction, we headed for the tram stop and practiced our best Japanese compaction procedures as the tram was totally packed. I had a map to the Fort which showed the tram stops, and fortunately it coincided with the brief English announcement made before each stop. At the fort, most of the tram passengers got off with us. We paid our 230Y ($2.30) and followed the hordes to the Fort. Lots of people went into the tower structure so we elected to walk into the fort and walk its perimeter. It was 500 Yen to visit the Magistrate's Building so we passed on that. This star shaped fortress was designed after European forts and has very pretty grounds. 

With a tight time table we exited the Fort grounds and went through the first floor of the Tower building. It was definitely too crowded to go up in the tower. So we caught the tram back to the JR station. We attempted to find where the student craft display was, but were unsuccessful.  

We then did a quick tour of the JR station (clean, neat, and no graffiti!) before catching a shuttle back to the ship and arrived there just before 3pm. We received a travel tip from another guest to take the tram to the top and then walk down the mountain. We may do that next time. We're finding it refreshing to get out of the cities and visit more natural things.

There were no vendors on the pier so we re-boarded the ship immediately. After dropping my backpack off at the stateroom I gathered up my tour materials from the past three days and headed up to the Crow's Nest to update my blog and watch the sail away.

The Captain announced our immediate departure and that we would be sailing at top speed for Yokohama in order to arrive by midnight on 13 August which is 6 hours ahead of schedule. He also noted that the seas ahead starting in the afternoon tomorrow will be around 15 feet and there will definitely be motion onboard and to use care when moving around the ship.

I finished my Korsakov blog entry during the sail away and after dinner (Japanese night) with Erik & Marilyn, we went to the last Evening Insight which was a presentation on Coastal Features by Joe Holliday. Afterwards, I headed up to the LIDO where I've been for almost 3 hours updating the last two days of my blog. I've caught a cold and drinking tea while writing has brought some relief.

We are sailing at 22 knots (that's fast for this ship) and I'm starting to feel a bit more porpoising (up and down movement of the bow or front of the ship) as the evening goes on. There's no pitching (side to side motion). For a while we were in a fog bank and the fog horn went off every 2 minutes.

That's all for today. Things should begin to get very interesting weather wise tomorrow and over the next few days. Stay tuned.