Though nowhere as good as those Mt. Rainer's ones, but still something you can't find in Singapore. The taste is typical of a Starbucks coffee though. Just sweet.
Anyway, we had 3 major attractions packed for the day with no convenience of the car (it's all on the metro/bus at sapporo) and so we headed out early at around 8 plus in the morning for Moerenuma Koen. Getting to the park from the hotel was easy enough. Just hop onto the Toho subway line towards Fukuzumi and alight at Kanjo-Dori Higashi Station and change to bus #69 or #79 Chuo Bus at the bus terminal and get off right at the park's entrance.
There will be a bike rental shop right at the entrance, and you may rent a bike if you wish. The park is HUGE!
Not sure if this park will be colourful during the "right" season, but it was rather quiet, peaceful and filled with greens while we're there during the "off-peak" season of late May/early June.
And of course, the chilly weather calls for yet another milk soft serve!
And you can't leave the park without snapping a shot on THIS pathway in the park.
Moerenuma Park is opened daily from 7am to 10pm. For more information, visit their website HERE.
And to get to our next attraction on our itinerary (for lunch), we headed to the park's west entrance and took bus #61 from Okadama Koukou stop straight to Sapporo Beer Museum (Hakubutsukan). There's two different bus routes stopping at the SAME stop, so do take note of the direction and the bus's corresponding arrival time. They will be RIGHT ON THE DOT, so you won't need to worry about boarding the wrong bus because you cannot decide if the bus that turns into the stop is serving the route you wish to go.
The main point of this attraction is actually NOT the hakubutsukan, but the Bier Garten that is located right beside the museum. At the Bier Garten, you can find about 4 or 5 different buildings that each house a different restaurant/cafe providing different kind of food. But since the BF and I were both starving by the time we reached, it's definitely gonna be Genkis Khan (BBQ)!
The interior of the restaurant can get pretty smokey, so you might want to prepare for yourself some hair mist or body mist to get rid of the BBQ smell after you're done with lunch.
And of course, you can't do without beer at the Bier Garten, right? Nobody cares it's mid-afternoon. Everyone gets a pint. Well, almost.
Ittadakimasu!
Although not the most pocket-friendly meal (but not exorbitant either, don't worry), you definitely have to give this a try when you're at the bier garten. DO NOT TRY TO SAVE ON THIS MEAL. Go save on other stuff, but not these meats!
Looking very gleeful with a tummy full of meat!
Well, to make our trip a little more "worthwhile", we did check out the museum, and also grabbed a drink and "cheese testing platter" but I have to say, if you have other attractions to rush to, just skip the museum altogether.
The next attraction to check off on our itinerary was probably the highlight of the day, Shiroi Koibito Park! The initial plan was to take a 25 minutes walk from the kakubutsukan back to Bus Center Mae Station and take the Tozai Line to Miyanosawa Station, and the park should be a 10 minutes walk away. But since the bus stop right at the hakubutsukan looked way too tempting, and there's chuo bus service that brings us to another subway station (albeit not on Tozai Line I think, but still we can always switch the lines midway), we decided to take the less calorie-spending way of getting to the park.
And it's just so that there's a direct bus service from the bus terminal beside the subway station, that brings you directly to the theme park!
I believe most of us will try to first map out the route to take using googlemap while planning the itinerary and I strongly suggest you do another quick check on googlemap while you're out and about in Japan as chances are you'll get a much quicker, more convenient route via their very extensive and reliable bus service instead of wholly on the subway and foot.
Although I have no idea what's the direct link to cats, but it seems like the theme of cats also makes up a vital part of the park. You're supposed to follow the cat paw prints on the floor to to complete your self-tour of the park.
You can also sign yourself up for a cookie-making workshop and bring back the cookies you've baked. But the staff here aren't very fluent in English (they do have Mandarin speaking service staff though) so do take that into consideration.
There's a cafe on the 1st floor (if I've remembered it accurately) selling cooked food like curry rice, and also another cafe at the top floor selling very yummy looking sweet treats!
While you're here, I'll highly recommending trying their dark cocoa drink. Do remember to add in a few drops of the orange liquor for a more yummilicious flavour.
Shiroi Koibito Park is open daily from 9am to 6pm.
For more information, visit their website HERE.
And while walking around in the park, I spot this hamburger shop on the opposite side of the road and we decided to pop by for a quick meal.
And when you see hamburger in Japan, do not expect to get meat patties sandwiched in between two buns. Usually, their hamburgers are just the meat (beef & pork combined) patty. And since I couldn't eat beef, I went for some yummy chicken!
And after filling our tummies with some flavourful and tender meat, we retraced our footsteps (with a lot of help from googlemap, of course) back to Odori/Tanukikoji Shopping Street area.
Couldn't help but took a photo of their safety barrier. It's Chopper! There's Hello Kitty, and many other cute animals as well! If only we get such cute safety barriers in Singapore too.
And because the 10 degree Celsius rainy weather was just too cold for us, we jumped into a random ramen shop located beside the shopping street for our 2nd dinner meal of the nice.
Though not the best ever ramen you can get, and with noodles a little too hard for my liking, at about half the price you'll usually pay for a bowl of ramen in Singapore, this is almost twice as good!
So this basically marked the end of our Day 4 in Sapporo! Recount of my Day 5 in Sapporo is up HERE!
Till then,
Mia Foo
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