爸爸去哪儿-北海道之感想篇 (下）

Day 6

A day of sleep till you feel shiok enough and wake up according to your whims.

Brown and Sally were accompanying us throughout the trip, and for those who know me well enough, they are supposed to represent Daddy and Ryan. So we will still take them out for photos from time to time.

The snow fall overnight was pretty heavy, and my car was covered with snow when we were going to leave the hotel.


Daddy wasn't done with the farms yet, and made another dumb decision to drive to the nearby Tomita Melon House to see if it is really closed. And yes, it is closed. No smart and no luck


So I just aimlessly drove around the area to see if there are anymore surprise finds, only to find out that the whole area is deserted. Though the fresh snow meant that driving through the forest will look pretty awesome (that's if we don't have any accidents).


And since the snow was still fresh in the area, we just drove up to an empty open carpark, and just settled there for another round of snowman making together with a video call with mummy to show her and mei mei what we were doing live (improvised the snowman buttons with coins, which was a bad idea as it was difficult to remove after we were done, and I ended up with frostbites on my fingers)
 
It was a long drive back into Sapporo. Returning the car was a challenge though as I had to unload the luggage at the new hotel without car park access (public parking is horrendously expensive in the city) and finding the exact location of the car rental office was another challenge too. Topping up the fuel tank has to be done at the nearest petrol station and receipt must be shown (which I didn't take from the attendant - lesson learnt) to the car rental staff.

And off we go to the Odori Park X'mas market. The atmosphere, set up, illumination, xmas tree and shops were all spot on. It was a true X'mas market with the snow still falling on us while we made our way through the illumination displays across multiple parks and shops at the market.



It was a long tiring day for Ryan boy, and he totally concussed after going back to the hotel

Day 7
It's going to be another long day of taking the trains around the city, which will be fun for the boy. Ryan was still in high spirits on waking up, so after a pancake breakfast with Dino Brown and Sally chick, off we went to the famous Shiroi Koibito factory (or more commonly known as 白色恋人 in our part of the world).



There were plenty of signages along the way from the train station to the factory, so it was pretty easy getting around



The park around the factory was free for visiting and photo-taking.
The design was pretty quaint (half-timbered old German-styled architecture) together with a good handful of small houses/huts, a double-decked stationary London bus, a tree house and a mini-train that runs around the campus, which makes it an excellent place for photo-lust.



And of course, the factory/ museum itself was amazing in it's own rights, detailing the history of chocolate making and a view of the production floor (from above)



There was also workshops available for some hands-on for making your own Chocolate cookie, which I had to get Ryan to take up (I thought it was pretty fun though)



Their cafe was fully packed though, otherwise I would have chosen to take lunch there. Nonetheless, their soft serve ice cream at ground floor was outstanding - and I had lost count of the number of soft serves that I had taken throughout the trip...




And the standalone pop-corn stall just next to the park was pretty decadent too..
I think we probably spent close to 4 hours here (inclusive of time at a complimentary kids indoor playground). After that, we just went off to the Softbank Sapporo Factory, which had been revamped into a shopping mall - some nice deco, but nothing noteworthy of in my opinion. We were only looking for a place for some afternoon tea.

After night fall, we went on to the underground shopping mall, and found an outlet for the famous kinotoya bake cheese tart



and carried on to Susukino before settling down on a ramen shop for dinner, and finally making a 2nd trip to the illumination display again at Odori park, before retiring for the day



Day 8 (last day in Hokkaido)
Shopping day! Well, at least I had to buy some stuff back for mei mei.
Walked to the JR Tower, and the sun was just behind us in the morning, which yielded one of my favourite shot of the trip - the shadows of Daddy and son holding hands in the snow
 

After a long internal struggle by Ryan on whether he should buy the UFO catcher toy, or the vending machine toy, we eventually ended up buying both 2 large toys, with Daddy getting worried on whether he will be able to carry all of these luggage single handedly to the airport



Well, Daddy will always find a way to pack all the luggage isn't it...
Took the train back to CTS airport with some time to spare, as the airport itself has a couple of pretty new attractions as well.

Royce chocolate factory - where we went on another shopping spree to buy chocolate gifts for his teachers




And we eventually chose to go into Hello Kitty land instead of Doraemon land, due to the limited time left for the tour. Pretty good choice as we were the only ones in the theme park and had the whole place to ourselves. Though it was just an elaborate photo-taking session with various Country-themes



After the check in, there wasn't any additional checks on the hand-carry luggage, and I see almost everyone carrying oversized hand-carry onboard. So we continued unabated with the snack buying in the departure hall. Once onboard, Lady Luck smiled on us and left the 3rd seat in our row empty, and Ryan got to lie down to sleep on my lap on the flight back to SG.




Final thoughts
Even though there were trying times during this trip, where Ryan just didn't want to eat despite not consuming much food (he actually lost weight over the trip), and I had scolded him numerous times for that, his body language told me that he was really enjoying himself throughout the entire trip, and true to that, he continued to express that this was the best time of his life on numerous occasions throughout 2018.

I made a promise to Ryan that I'll bring him back to visit Hokkaido again someday, and true to promise, that we will be making a return together with Mummy and Mei mei at the end of 2018.

Hope that our Round 2 will be as fascinating as the first trip!

Work lessons

It was a horrible week at work

But having calmed my shit down over the weekend and having the Wise-Me review what and where went wrong with the Pride-Me, clearly shows that I still have much to learn at work

Long story (and tweaked context for confidentiality)... an indirect superior that I had been working with for a long time, grilled me for something that he thought had been completed some time ago.

When he didn't get the "right answer" that he was expecting from me, he started to ask WHY the shit wasn't done yet.

I went into details telling him that we were given wrong info by another dept, and I had laid the ground work to clear their shit before we can get to the answer he wanted, and he was copied in the emails too.

He lost it and started to question every single thing that I did, and asked me to provide the relevant documentation, which I dutifully did, 6x over, with time stamps organised in chronological order.

Still, not the answer that he wanted, and he pulled me into a 1-1 meeting asking me for the answer he wanted. Meeting didn't go well and I became extremely frustrated at why a one time strong ally had suddenly changed into a stubborn bull that refuses to see the 1001 pieces of evidence that were placed in his face, and just want to bulldoze his way to get his expected answer.

In the 2nd external meeting on the same day, he went ahead to commit to a key customer (with extremely poor credit, that just made a 1 year payment for the last 12 months monthly instalment payment) that a product feature (which is NOT ready yet) is ready for the customer to use today, with 3 months deferred payment terms, in whatever kind of currency that they wish to pay in, to whomever in the company that they wish to pay to.

I was questioned why I didn't go and understand what was this customer's pain, which I explained that it was well documented together with our local sales person, that the customer had a ungrounded fear of our bank devulging his contact details to his competitor.

Good thing is that the superior wanted me to send the meeting minutes out after a 3rd internal call on the same day. I just wrote whatever he committed and distributed to the wider audience (credit, finance, operations) on his words and commitments, at verbatim.

Reactions came in fast n furious as expected.

Clarifications and warnings came, stating the exact same words that I had used. But they received the same stubborn bull reaction too.

So everyone concluded that things were getting confusing and wanted me to organise a meeting call to clarify matters.

"Great. Just the audience that I needed to back me up"

The superior called me in for another 1-1 the next day, and after both of us had calmed down a bit. He spoke of observing my "changed behaviour" that I was getting defensive instead of being open like what I used to be. He still didn't want to hear any explanations on what happened or where went wrong. So I just pointed out to him that he didn't provide the resources that he had promised to commit to make our project a successful one. We went away from this meeting with a follow up from my side to write down what I needed from him.

The 3rd call still has not taken place yet, but I took some time to summarise all the lengthy emails into a 1 page visual process and sent it to all through the calendar invite. Received positive response from close colleagues on the clarity.

From this LONGGGGGG story, there were numerous observations:

1) When in the face of being picked-on, Pride-Me was obsessed with being right instead of being expedient. Bad choice to choose Justice over Political correctness

2) Pride-Me was too emotionally charged and got defensive, and went head on with a charging bull

3) Pride-Me expected the same old reasonable behaviour from the indirect superior that he had worked with for years. He has changed. Remember the book, Who Moved My Cheese

4) Pride-Me didn't realise that my customer in this instance is the indirect superior. Don't expect the customer to understand u, it's your job to understand the customer, what he wants, and give it to him to close the damned order

When a stubborn bull is charging at you, instead of trying to be a brainless warrior and tackle it head on, be like a bullfighter. Guide the bull to where you want him to charge to with the red flag. Let it ram into the wall if there's a need. I don't advocate back stabbing though. Just don't freaking stand in the way and tank the charging damage!

If all fails, just roll over and pretend to die. Live to fight another day.

Pride-Me wants to win every single battle.
Wise-Me chooses the important ones to win

1st proper swim coaching for Ryan

It has been a long wish of mine to teach Ryan how to swim, ever since I became a swim coach.

Ryan never really took to the water, and was even slightly water phobic, thus I had been receiving non-stop questions along the line of "you are a swim coach, your son must be a good swimmer too"

Pool sessions in the past were mostly confined to the pool at Sis's condo, usually when all the kids will be crowding around me to play, and Ryan will shy away at one corner to play with his water gun.

Even the previous 1-1 session at Pasir Ris swimming complex didn't went well, simply due to the fact that Ryan still wasn't mentally resilient enough to put in enough effort and tenacity to learn a difficult life skill, which requires a long period of learning, rather than something that he can pick up in a minute or 2.

After about 4 months of classes with People Impact, I can tell the obvious improvement in Ryan's behaviour on accepting challenges and not easily giving up when asked to.

So, I took some time off this afternoon to pick up Ryan earlier from school to go for a 1-1 swim coaching session at SAFRA Yishun, when the pool isn't crowded.

Concepts on coaching adults to swim can be adapted and used on kids as well.
The fundamental flow is still similar, even with the TI method, though the basics have to be even more elaborate, explicit and abridged, since kids will not be able to understand complex concepts.

Instead of jumping straight into learning strokes, which most swim coaches will do, I focused on getting Ryan more confident and comfortable in water first.

He is a timid and cautious boy when it comes to physical activities, thus will require a fair bit of prompting and experimentation, before he is willing to adopt and learn new subskills.

Today's curriculum:

• Basic prone flutter kick (no cycling kick)
• Bubbling out underwater in upright position
• Bouncing Bear
• Crab Walk

Part of these are probably part of the old CSA curriculum that I had previously taught, but honestly I don't have much recollection of what was in the curriculum. These were by experience and gut feel on what will help Ryan to gain water confidence through play, rather than over focus on achieving a perfect flutter kick or breaststroke kick.

I was pleasantly surprised that Ryan eventually managed to do all of the above and even took the initiative to practice more at the end of the session when I asked him to leave the pool.

Gotta spend more time with the boy and get him to be able to swim a simple breaststroke before end of 2018

CIP 2018 Race Report

This race had the potential to be one of my best race, yet it turned out to be my first DNF due to a technical fault, which once again highlighted the glaring shortcoming in my racing repertoire - cycling.

Having done long distance road running (though not super outstanding) for years had given me enough experience on handling the effects and optimised my racing strategies based on my current physical conditions, I will also know when and how to push it when needed.

Swimming shouldn't even be a question since I'm carrying the TI name, though I should be looking at clocking even faster times

Cycling? Nah. Just use the same old cyclo-cross bike that I had bought years ago, with no upgrades or changes to the parts that I started with. (a well meaning friend helped me to procure this bike, thinking that I may need the versatility of handing different cycling conditions, even though I made it clear that the only reason to cycle is for racing tris. My fault that I can't tell the difference between road bike /tri bike /cyclo Cross)

Cheapo me trying to squeeze mileage out of the miserly fortune that I had spent on this bike, resulting in poor mediocre race results which I gladly used to explain poor race performances.

Again, the prep for CIP 2018 wasn't fantastic as I always do. No brick training, didn't clock the required mileage for each discipline, though I had a minor breakthrough in swimming.

After making some minor changes to my solo swim practices, of getting more used to faster tempo, I finally managed to, for the first time, break the 30 min barrier for 1500m in a pool. The gains were purely technique based rather than any physical conditioning, so I was pretty pleased when I clocked a 35min swim this year, which was pretty close to my pool pace. (a 10min improvement from last year, which I admittedly fared poorly)

The longest single ride that I managed to clock on training was at 78km, though I could feel that I managed to get some gains as well as I could feel I was getting stronger in the aeroposition. Though I had a minor episode in my final practice ride last week of getting stranded at the remote end of changi coastal road with 2 flats. The first was a long standing minute puncture that slowly deflated the rear tyre, which I realised on the ride and tried to fix it. I cleared out 2 small metal pieces from the tyre and used the CO2 cartridge to inflate the tyre, which ended up bursting immediately, as the inner tube was caught in a pinch by the tyre. Had to call dad for rescue at 6am without trying to get them worried about something really nasty that happened to me.

Well, it seems that I didn't really learn from that incident, and repeated the same mistake in the race. 25km into lap 1 and a fellow participant pointed out I was running on flat. Stopped by the road to fix it. Repeated the same steps but this time with the hand pump. The replacement was filling up nicely as I tried to get it to 80psi. And at the moment when I hit 80psi, I heard another burst, and at that moment, I realised that I repeated the same mistake and ended my race prematurely. My 1st DNF for a 703 race. Even when I was fully bloodied in cebu, I didn't give up.

This was technical, so there's no way I could get back into this race. As I came to grips with the reality of DNF, I could only pick myself up and slowly walk back to the transition area, hoping that the race officials will come by and spot me, and ferry me back to TA and put me out of my misery. After a long walk and multiple officials stopping by, one of them finally offered to ferry me and my bike on his motorbike - yes, handcarry my bicycle as I pillion on his motorbike. Whatever it takes man...

Got back to the officials tentage, and took my DNF, lamenting that chance of PB in such a rare fine weather. The officials suggested that I could continue with the run, just without timing chip and no official results (still DNF) and I jumped at the opportunity! Afterall I'm just after the fun of completing, timing didn't really mean much except for an official record. Not that the official timing will be of any use anyway.

Checked in my bike into the TA, did my T2 and started my run. It was a pretty unique experience though, as it was the time when the 1st female Pro just ran into T2, so I was effectively starting my run with the Pros!

Was a little ashamed of the fact that I'm a DNF, and the spectators took my photos as I ran past them, though I tried to keep my pace respectable in the first half of the run. Pretty chill to have the empty run course all to myself for lap 1, as I kept up the 5.30 to 5.45 pace for the first 10km.

Took the 2nd lap much more slowly as stitches and cramps started to set in. After a good 3km of run walk, I managed to get back into a slow jog to run off the pain. It never went off. I just managed to endure it as I picked up pace again as I got nearer to the finish line.

The time on my watch showed 1h59m as I crossed the finish line, but the distance seems to be 19km instead of 21km. Doesn't matter. What I had gathered was the damned mental strength and agility to manage the physical condition and pain to be just below the red line of cramping up again.

The race clock probably showed 4h51m when I crossed the finish line. I just kept low and walked back to the TA to pick up my hotel room card.

I probably raised a few eyebrows with the Elites on why this nondescript guy managed to finish so quickly.  (same expression I saw on those still cycling when I started run lap 1)

Even though this was a DNF, I guess I had more chuckles than being sad about it.

Key takeaways :
Best swim so far. Continue to refine my TI technique to continue improving!
Great management on the run. Grind through the pain and mental weakness, and the body can carry through.
Damned that freaking excuse of a lousy bike. Time to look into upgrading if I wanna continue racing Tris. Not only the physical bike, but also the knowledge, just like how I converted my worst discipline to my strongest suite. Time to get more technical.

爸爸去哪儿-北海道之感想篇 (中）

Day 5
Ryan woke up with a nose bleed, which was stopped fairly quickly. It's most probably caused by the dry air. I had been religiously applying nose spray for him every night with the exception of the previous night as he had fell asleep before I could spray for him, and the repercussion was pretty immediate. Have to keep up with the nose spray.

We had bought instant noodles from 7-11 last night as today's breakfast, which takes away the problem of trying to find breakfast in the morning especially when it was snowing heavily. Ryan had not been finishing his meals over the last few days, so it was much easier to get him to finish the entire cup of instant noodles in the room, though the quantity wasn't barely enough.

Brought him back to the Asahikawa train station to continue our hunt for postal services to mail postcards back to Mom in Singapore. It has stopped snowing when we stepped out of the hotel, but the ground is already covered with fresh snow powder, probably about 5cm thick. So it made for nice photos as we crossed the road to the train station.

Found a post office and got Ryan to pen the post card to be addressed to Mummy and Rainie, and I wrote another to be sent to him. He loves receiving mail. It only costs 140 yen (about S$1.75) to mail 2 postcards back to SG

The park behind the train station was empty and covered with fresh powder, so we just ended up spending the remaining time playing in the snow before checking out of the hotel to visit the excellent Asahiyama zoo

The snow was starting to get heavier when we left the hotel, and the roads were totally covered with snow. This is the first time that I'm driving in snow covered urban roads, different from Otaru as it wasn't fully covered then.

With the advice of the rental company staff fresh in mind, I was driving much slower than the previous days, probably up to 50km/h on the straights.

At the first left turn that I had to make at a junction, I slowed down to probably about 25km/h, and the car started to skid towards another stationary car waiting on at the crossroad. Luckily, quick instincts pumped in, and I abandoned that turn, swerving back right and regained control and traction to put the car back onto a straight and quickly got out of the impending crash.
Huge lesson learnt: 25km/h is still too fast for turning on icy/snowy roads. Knock that down to 10km/h max

Slowly made our way to the famed Asahikawa Zoo. Parking was free and entrance was free for Ryan. I was expecting a really small zoo from the online reviews. True to that, it was on the small size, though the cold weather made it a slightly longer walk than 2 hours.
The penguin parade is only available later into the winter season, but seeing them upclose and through an underwater aquarium was good enough.


It was neat to see how differently the animals behave in winter. Tigers, Black bear, Polar bear, Snow Leopards, Timberwolves, etc

The only problem was that, Ryan was only interested in the snow rather than the animals, so it wasn't long before he got bored and it started to get too cold. So we shared a hot bowl of udon and a can of hot corn soup for him at the Zoo's cafe before hitting the road again to our next destination.

From this point onwards, the roads were fully covered in (fresh) snow, so the driving difficulty slowly inched up as we moved further inland

Did the dumb thing of visiting Shikisai No Oka during winter.
It is supposed to be a sea of beautiful flowers/colours, but alas, we visited at the wrong season, thus we could only see an endless sea of white powder instead, though it was enough to make the boy happy again, and he was up for another few rounds of snow-angel making again.


The only consolation for Daddy was the oiishi Lavendar soft serve ice cream, which despite the freezing temperatures, was absolutely worth it. Of course it was mainly for Daddy to eat, and I only gave Ryan a few nibbles at the ice cream and the entire cone biscuit. Gotta make sure that he doesn't catch a cold












Didn't stay for too long at the farm, and made our way to the best accommodation of the entire trip, Furano La Terre. (more on this later)

Both of us weren't really feeling hungry, so it was another quick visit to the top attraction in Furano, the picture-risque Ningle Terrace

It wasn't an easy place to navigate or drive to, as the GPS and google maps were giving conflicting instructions most of the time. However, I just persisted with Google map and it eventually brought us to the correct location, though not without much detour and wasted gas.


Ningle Terrace looks straight out of a Children Fairy tale storybook, with quaint timber cottages and workshops in the middle of a forrest, perched on top of a hill.

It was already nightfall when we reached, so the pretty lights were all up, and with the continued snow, the atmosphere was nothing short of magical - though Ryan was already getting fatigued at this point, and probably had not read his fair share of Western fairy tales to fully appreciate what he was seeing, not to mention that it was getting crazy cold..

And soon we were off in search of our dinner. Brought him to a nearby Italian restaurant  for some pizza, curry rice and warm milk. I guess he probably spent more of his dinner time playing at the small play area in the restaurant rather than at the table dining with Daddy.


The drive back to the hotel was the #2 most challenging drive for me ever in my life (#1 was the extremely dangerous solo 80km Taroko Gorge ride in the middle of the night in Taiwan back in 2009). The roads leading back to the hotel had started to gather black ice, which means that it was extremely easy to skid out of control, which was evident from the car that was infront of mine. I had to be at 110% focus to just drive in a straight line at 20km/h to 30km/h, and I was still skidding most of the time.

Nonetheless it was an uneventful drive back to the fantastic Furano Le Terre.
Worth a special mention about the exceptional service and honesty.
I made an online reservation for 1 room with 2 persons, but on check-in, the reception informed me that the rate that I had paid was for 2 adults, and they proactively changed my bill to 1 adult and 1 child. Even for such an experienced traveller as me, I'm really impressed by their attention to details, and the introduction to the hotel facilities, the tips and tricks, were simply beyond 5 stars.



And there is a large inhouse onsen, which I gladly brought Ryan to experience again. Great fun and learning for him, though he is fully exhausted by the time we were done with the bath. It's always so sweet to see children sleeping naturally in such a cute pose :)

Back to busy

Writing this on my mobile as I'm stuck in the causeway customs jam at 6am on a Saturday morning

2nd week into January and I'm back at full speed at work and business.

Completed a 3 day business planning meeting in Bintan this week, and will be visiting Bangkok for customer meetings on this coming Monday to Wednesday, sandwiching a weekend coaching session in Malaysia.

Just had only 3 hours of sleep before driving off this morning. Mei has fell sick since the start of my Bintan trip and brought her to the Dr last night. Viral fever. And the kids and mom stayed over at grandma's for the night

This is the unhealthy cycle which has been bothering me for the last 2 years. Am I going to make a break through this year and make the necessary changes for a healthier work cycle, for myself and the family?

Ryan is going to P1 next year, and is starting to feel the effects of daddy going on frequent work trips more keenly. One of my biggest wish is to be able to spend more quality time with him. Teaching and showing him all the beautiful things in life before he gets into the academic grind cycle.

Mei is also starting to be more sensible, so I'll need to spend more time with her too.

As I'm finishing this post in the car, the song "忙與盲＂ by 周華健 just played... How apt...

爸爸去哪儿-北海道之感想篇 (上）

Long article ahead

Didn't really plan for this in advance, even to the point that my accommodations were only finalised just 2 days before flying off. 

It all started with the thought that I had to clear a good number of annual leave before end of the year, and with the kids usually "forced to" behave better when daddy is around, it just came to me that I should bring one of the kids out for a 1 to 1 holiday, and see how he/she survive with daddy (or the other way round). It was also triggered by an article that I read long time ago that one of China action movie actor (can't remember whom was it) did the same with his boys many years ago, though that was more of a boot camp to toughen up his sons that he deemed was overly soft and pampered at home

Of course, the more modern and fashionable version is the 爸爸去哪儿 series that's in the rage for the past few years 

Mummy didn't think mei mei will survive with daddy alone, and Ryan pretty much obeys daddy, so the choice was obvious on which one to bring. And with him going to move to  P1 in 14 months, there isn't much time left for  an adventure without the burdens of adhering to the school holiday schedule nor homework

Original choice was to bring him to Taiwan for a scooter backpacking trip again, but the price for air tickets was 3x the normal rates, and scoot just launched a new direct flight to Sapporo. Timing is pretty decent too. With tickets to Japan cheaper than Taiwan? The choice is a no brainer 

The dates to visit wasn't the most ideal as it is during the fall to winter transition, which means that there is no glorious colours of autumn nor full winter festivals available. But hey, the cheaper room prices for low season makes up for it as a first foray into a new destination. It didn't have to be a perfectly planned holiday for the whole family. It's just quality boys time together. What we actually do or visit is secondary

Ryan was fully anticipating the trip after I had made the bookings and he told everyone in school about it. Mei mei didn't really understand until the morning that I sent her to school alone and told her I'll be away for a week with Ryan. She missed her brother quite badly in subsequent video calls that we made

First night in Hokkaido was spent at the airport hotel. Functional and made perfect sense since the flight touched down at 7+, and it would have been a mad rush to get to the city for dinner and check in by taking the JR train. And to think that we will be driving off with the rental car the next morning, it wouldn't make sense to go to the city without having the time to actually see it. Saved the trouble and picked up the rental car next day at the airport. Great decision 

Day 2

Picking up the rental car from Budget was smooth. The service staff kept emphasizing "drive slowly" endlessly as accident rate is high for people not accustomed to driving in snow and ice. Took the HEP package for highway toll at 6700 yen for 5 days. Good choice #2 since the total cost on highway toll that I would have incurred on ala carte prices will be far more expensive. (I didn't know at the point of purchase. Was just thinking of convenience then)

Drove to Jigokudani (hell valley) near Noboreibetsu for the sulphurous hot spring. It was snowing when we reached. This is Ryan and Daddy's first encounter with snow (falling from the sky, not the dirty ones next to the roads). Boy was exhilarated to see the falling snowflakes and went on and on creating tracks in the snow covered ground. First time stepping on fresh snow and ice feels.... Soft yet Crunchy... Snow wasn't thick enough for snow angel yet so that had to wait till our visit to the ski resort on Mount Teine on Thursday 

Brought him over to the nearby Oyunuma foot soak for a bit of hot spring water foot down but a combination of nature's call and first encounter with freezing temperatures meant that I had to skip the foot soak even though we were already at the location.

Drove around to find the famed ice cream at the town before leaving for Lake Toya. Pretty good stuff. Glad I didn't skip this. Never thought that eating ice cream in freezing temperatures would make sense, but I eventually downed another 4 on this trip. 

Driving tip: Always plan to end your drive before dusk on day 1 of driving. Night drive is high risk for neophytes. 

Checked in at Daiwa Ryokan at Lake Toya. It was more of a half ryokan half hotel. Futon beds check. No in room toilet check. Yukata provided check (kids yukata costs extra 300yen). Public bath check. 

Brought Ryan for dinner at Boyotei just across the road from our stay. It was a quaint Classic European cottage styled restaurant, serving quality Japanese Western fusion food. Atmosphere was fantastically romantic for dating couples, but just neat for us. 

Dusted off the dinner and went back to the hotel, planning to go for the first dip into a public bath. I clearly forgotten about the objective of visiting Lake Toya for the White Illumination, until I saw the brochure at the reception. 

It was a short but cold walk from our hotel. The White Illumination was just a 70m tunnel fitted with lots of LED lights that looked awesome in photos. Not a huge place but still a pretty good photo stop for maybe about 20 minutes before it got too cold and we had to adjourn back to our room for the hot bath. 

It was my first time at a public bath too so I didn't really know what to do or expect, though I had seen some glimpses through movies /animes. Good thing that the bath was empty so we didn't have to worry about not following whatever protocol. He had a field day playing in the warm bath and splashing water around. 

Futon beds were pretty comfortable from our last trip, so it was a good night sleep for both of us after a long day

Day 3

Cold wet morning with limited views on Lake Toya, though to be fair, our room has a fantastic Lake view, just that the weather wasn't playing nice. Brought Ryan for a short walk by the lake side for some phototaking before going to a nearby cafe for breakfast. 

Ryan wasn't feeling well and puked at the table so I just rushed him back to the warmth of our room to wash him up without finishing the food. I was worried that he had fell sick from the cold. Luckily it was probably just that his stomach didn't agree well to the yogurt milk he drank earlier. 

Checked out and off we went to the next ice cream place: Cafe Lake Toya

The ice cream was pretty good, but not as impressive as the one we had the day before. There were 2 separate shops in the same farmhouse. Ice cream parlour on the left and cafe on the right. We popped over to the cafe after finishing the ice cream, and the pastry looked pretty good and they had hot milk available, so I just bought the milk, pastry and pudding to redouble up as Ryan's breakfast, which he wiped almost everything. I can imagine that the views of this cafe will have been impressive in other seasons as it overlooks a vast swathe of farmland, which was already covered by snow when we reached

Off we went again and it will be a long and difficult drive to our next stop, cutting across the mountains. It started snowing as we drove uphill, and the snow much got heavier as we went higher

And what luck do we have! We actually chanced upon Kokusai ski resort along the way. This was the original ski resort that I was planning to go to as it opens earlier than others. Stopped by and went in to take a look. There were already high piles of snow at the car park so Ryan and I were already throwing snowballs at each other before we walked to the resort. After watching other people ski, Ryan decided that throwing snowball was much more interesting and we just pretty much did only that at the ski resort till we left

Reached Otaru in the late afternoon, and experienced my first challenge of driving in snow /ice /water. Since this was urban driving so speeds were dead slow and I didn't have too much issues with driving. 

Circled around a few times before finally locating my accommodation. Level 4 with narrow stairs, so I just had to leave the big luggage on the car and carry only the backpack to the room. Good decision #3 to bring the big backpack

Going out for dinner was a disaster. 

The roads were covered with snow, ice and water, so apart from being slippery, it meant that water will seep into our shoes too. I didn't change into my SAF boots before going out as it was in the car. Bad decision #1. So we ended up with wet shoes after visiting the famed Otaru canal and getting our Sushi dinner. 

Packing tip: Pack a couple of days' worth of clothes and toiletries in the big backpack for easy access when it is difficult to Manoeuvre the big luggage

The heater in the room works fantastically well as a clothes dryer though and all the wet clothes/socks/shoes were dry by the next morning

Day 4

Walked to the nearby Otaru train station, where the Sankaku fish market is located next to. Touted as one of the top "To-Do" attractions on TripAdvisor, I found it to be underwhelming, especially when we had visited Tsukiji Fish Market in Tokyo earlier this year. Sankaku is just a miniaturized version of Tsukiji, and it's just a short street with limited seafood instead of an entire neighbourhood with more variety. Nonetheless, Hokkaido seafood is undoubtedly the best in business, and the Seafood bowl that I had really turned my buds on for more fresh sea urchin on this trip. Never really liked Uni until this meal.

Back to the ryokan for checkout and drove over to the well-reputed LeTAO main store. Managed to stumble across an industrial area nearby where I could park for free, so we ended up spending close to about 1.5 hours in the area.

Numerous blogs/sites/travel tips have pointed to LeTAO as a must visit site at Otaru, that their cheese cakes/cookies were to die for. I had no idea what to expect until I saw this image on Google

then I realized that I had been buying their cheese cookies for a long time thinking that the brand name was OTARU instead of LeTAO.... Aha & Dumb moment...

Ground level was their main store where the service staff were handing out generously portioned samples to customers in the shop. Brought Ryan to their cafe at level 2 for a sit-in experience and to take our time for a nice cafe/cake/tea break. The cafe wasn't ostentatiously decorated. Simple, clean, bright and comfortable. Traveling during the low season has its perks. We got the best corner sofa seat and the cafe was almost empty at 11am.

The Double Fromage and Choc Fromage cakes was simply out of the world. I'm no cheesecake connoisseur by any means, but the Double Fromage is simply the best cheesecake that I had ever tasted in my life. Now I understand the rave about it. Ryan wasn't too interested in the cakes though, still thinking about going out to play with snow all the time.

Dropped by at the Post office across the road to mail a postcard back home to mummy but it wasn't open, so it was just a few quick snaps with the cute classic postbox


And off we went to the nearby Mount Teine Ski resort for Round #2 of snow play.

It was conveniently located just within 40 mins drive from Otaru, and the drive isn't anywhere as treacherous as the drive across Nakayama pass that brought us to Kokusai the day before.

My colleague had recommended Teine over Kokusai for the better ski facilities and runs, and I could see why, on reaching the location. However, since we weren't planning on skiing, so it was just a simple task of finding a spot with fresh powder that is easy enough for Ryan to make snow angel,  snow balls and build our first ever snowman.
 
Now then will I appreciate the fact that Snowman is not easy to build, especially if you have no proper equipment. We spent probably about 15 minutes to build a snowman that was around 60cm tall, and it wasn't as easy as it seem to just pile the snow. The base was rather straightforward, but shaping the head and making sure it doesn't roll off while making it bigger isn't the easiest task.
We didn't have any spare accessories with us to decorate the snowman, so we just had to make do with the nearby twigs and leaves. Collateral damage - frost bite on my right hand. Seeing the boy's radiant satisfied smile on completing his first ever snowman? 千金难买


Oh, and I came across an abandoned kid snow sled at the carpark, so it was a first for us playing on the snow sled as well! Works pretty well on slightly compressed snow as it was easy to pull Ryan around
 
Spent about close to 2 hours here before driving off to our next destination: Asahikawa
It was going to be a long drive but on the expressway, so it wasn't that bad, just that it took a little bit longer than expected and we reached our next stay after nightfall. Good thing that it wasn't snowing so the drive was relatively smooth.

The next stay was at Route Inn Grand Hotel, which was just a stone throw away from the Asahikawa JR station, so it was easy to find. Ryan was fascinated by the automated car park at the hotel and was peeping through the window when the car lift spun our car around before lifting it up for parking.

I was starving by then, as we didn't really take regular meals but took numerous small snacks most of the time. Brought him to the TripAdvisor top rated Genghis Khan BBQ shop for dinner.




Bad decision.
The food was delicious without a doubt, but it wasn't the best place to bring a 5 year old as the entire restaurant was super smoky and oily. The sputtering of the oil and fats that was melting off the meat didn't endear the boy to the food, and he was soon put off and just took mostly plain rice instead. Easily ranks as one of the poorest choice I had made in this trip

Brought him back to the train station area as there was a large AEON shopping mall just next to it to hunt for more food but he simply mentioned that he wasn't hungry, so it was just another packet of milk for him to end the night.

It started to snow lightly again when we were going to return to the hotel. The large open space just infront of the train station made it easier for us to hold our hands out and wait for the snowflakes to land on our hands

After putting Ryan back to bed, then it started to snow much more heavily. The roads were fully covered with snow within an hour. It's gonna be a fun day tomorrow in snow!