Sorry for the long delay! I got really caught up with work and some personal travel. I'm looking to have another post or two per day to finish this out.


This day was a bit more straightforward of driving. 4 roadside stations, Obihiro station to print off some more of our train vouchers (and another lid), followed by one more train station (Shintoku) for a lid and then heading to our hotel in Eniwa to drop off our bags and and return the car. The nippon rent a car was open until 10pm so as long as we returned the car by then, we would be fine. We didn't want to return it the next morning because we wanted to get down to Sendai as early as possible, and with the car rental dropoff involving taking a shuttle to the airport, then a train to a connecting train station to start the journey back down, we just would lose too much time in the morning to make the morning trains down.


7hrs 56 minutes, 449 km or 279 miles

We got up nice and early to have breakfast at the international restaurant, but once again it was a bit of a letdown in terms of overall quality. It was mostly international dishes but again we both agreed it just wasn't very good, so wrapped up and checked out. At checkout I was given a bag with some flavored snacks as an apology because the outside onsen was closed, which I hadn't even known. I did also have to pay a small fee directly to the resort that Agoda couldn't (it was made clear during the booking). We threw everything into the vehicle but decided to take a very quick walk around the resort since it was light out.

It was a bit of a contrast walking just past the resort. There was a nice stream behind our resort, but there was also a broken bridge and an older, abandoned resort.


I don't think we are supposed to cross this bridge


This view gave me kind of a European mountain-resort vibe! But you can see the abandoned building right on the left hand side.


Our first stop today was an hour out in the Kitami region to the "Roadside Rest Area "Onneyu-Onsen". There was a new pokemon lid there which was the main reason, however this rest stop also has a really cool attraction:


There is a large karakuri cuckoo clock tower that plays at the top of every hour. I had got us to the tower right around 8:59, so we were able to see the tower in action. You can also go inside the tower, and there's a couple fun interactive games. You can even go upstairs and see the karakuri resting. It was a fun way to spend 10 minutes just walking around and messing with the games.




Cheddar Bear with the photo opp, where there wasn't enough room for two stuffed bears

We went back into the actual rest area to get our stamps and see our pokelid, which was so new it hasn't even been placed in the ground yet:


Curling themed, so cool!



The next stop was a 45 minute drive southeast to Rikubetsu, where our lid was located at an old train station. There was no regular JR service here, but there is a sceneic train that runs back and forth with some of the nearby cities. This was another lid I was looking forward to with all the colors.



We did also see one of the scenic trains in a wrap:


Older, still kind of cool though. No comfort inside from what we could see.


Another 30 minute drive down to Ashoro for a lid and stamp at the roadside rest are "Ashoro Ginga Hall 21", and then a 20 minute drive farther south to "roadside rest area stella honbetsu". Honbetsu has a regional mascot named Genki-kun, which is "a soybean filled with dynamism and easiness". He made appearances in several billboards and ads such as this one:


Room for two!

There was also another lid at the station that we stumbled upon, not a pokemon one, but still looked pretty cool:




From Honbetsu, the plan was to head to the train station in Obihiro to grab another lid, but to also exchange a couple more train vouchers. I wanted to try and practice using the ticket system at a time and place where we weren't rushed. Of the 20 some train legs I had already reserved, I only had tickets printed for the first 3 for Emily and I from the counter at the JR airport station. Once I found the right machine it was easy enough to use, especially since the tickets were linked to my passport through the JR pass. I think we also stopped at a Lawson as well for some snacks.



According to Wikipedia Obihiro has a greater population (163,804) then Otaru (107,000), so I was a bit anxious to see how I would fare driving in another busy city. Traffic was hectic, but okay, in Otaru, but I was also still new to driving in Japan. Luckily for me, Obihiro was much more quiet (probably due to being more spread out). Even though I drove right to the train station, traffic was great and presented little challenge.


From Obihiro, we drove another 45 minutes to the Northwest to Shintoku, a much smaller city to grab a lid at the JR station. When we got to the station, there was a lot of construction going on near the pedestrian walkways. This stop was a little out of the way, so it would have been a bit disappointing to find the lid covered. However, one of the workers saw us and brought us over to the lid, where they had managed to leave it uncovered - which to me says everything you need to know about Japanese culture.

So cool that they left this uncovered for people to see.

The plan from here originally was to now head back to Eniwa, where our hotel was. It's about a 2-3 hour drive depending on if you take the toll roads or not. I did notice there was one more pokelid that we didn't originally plan for, that we could see with only adding an extra 20ish minutes. Even though most people here would probably say that's enough driving, we of course decided to go check it out.

As we started to drive out of shintoku, it started to get really dark and windy, as a storm was approaching. We made one more stop, this time at a SeicoMart, which I didn't know at the time was local to Hokkaido. The chicken I got here was definitely my favorite so far. While it did get dark, it only rained briefly and was actually pretty uneventful. The drive to our next stop - Mikasa City Museum - would take a little over two hours.

Along the way, we saw a sign for a nearby scenic waterfall lookout - Sanadan Falls - and of course just going with the flow, decided to pull over and check it out.



If you can't tell, we like waterfalls.




While not as breathtaking as the ones we seen yesterday, and was still very beautiful and helped to break up the drive. Back in the car we made the remaining hour or so drive to the City Museum, which is a natural history museum. It's also very fitting that the pokemon lid at this location featured some of the fossil pokemon.

Satisifed for what we had accomplished seeing for the day, we started zig-zagging our way down to Eniwa, which is where our hotel was for the night. We were also tracking the Vulpix AirDO plane that was on approach to CTS, however we were too far away to see it.

I filled up on gas right next to our hotel, which is important to know for the next couple paragraphs. Checking in was easy enough. Due to the location of the Fairfield Inn in Eniwa, it was about a 25 minute walk to the train station. I asked the hotel to arrange a shuttle for us at 545am, but they were unable to confirm one that early for me. Our first train was at something like 615am - I was told we could get a 6am taxi but that was too close to cut for my liking, so just told them we'd have to walk.

The Fairfield Inn Eniwa is an almost brand new hotel. So new in fact I had trouble trying to find the best directions to the hotel, because I couldn't see it in google.
It was nice though to be back in a more traditional room. I have gold status with marriott through being a United Member, however don't believe Gold got me anything special here. I paid I think $135, with taxes, for a room plus 3,000 points bonus promo.


Fairfield Inn Eniwa



I took the car back to nippon rental car to drop it off where it went a bit awkward. I was asked for the fuel receipt which I didn't have on me, so just said I didn't have it. The vehicle was Full - and I was asked where I filled it up, and told them, but they didn't like that response either and it seemed to really bother them. They told me they would have to fill it up, which was silly because it ended up costing me like $3 (so it was 97% full and not 99% full) - but that's my fault I suppose. To be fair I was never told that I would need a receipt, just to bring it back full, but again I'll take blame on that as something I should have known better. Other then that, my rental with Nippon (again booked via National) was a very good experience. I appreciate them being open later at night then some others.

If you're trying to catch a train though, it's a bit unfortunate because you have to wait for the shuttle to go back to the airport, then change floors and take a train from the airport back to the Minami-chitose station, before you can continue on your journey. I suspect most people though are just continuing on to the airport.

We took the train back up to Megumino, a station that was a little bit closer to our hotel (but one that was not served early in the morning on the train I needed), to get one last train stamp in the region before the 20 minute walk back to our hotel.

There was one last pokemon lid to see, right next to our hotel, which was one Emily had as a must see:

One last Vulpix lid. Thanks for being a great regional mascot!


The plan for tomorrow was to start our Train Journey down to Sendai, where I would be getting another rental car for a bit of sightseeing, before ending back up downtown with a stay at the Westin.