Food Roulette

Here are the exciting dining adventures I had in Japan!

JAL served a teriyaki salmon and rice dish on our flight to Tokyo. It was delicious. That is all. 6/10

Upon our arrival, we were pretty hungry, so we stopped at a noodle house inside the train station near(ish) our hotel. These kinds of shops have a vending machine outside, where you select what you would like, put in money, and get a slip that you take to the counter and they give you your food. Marshall took some time looking at the pictures and bought himself some curry and then some yakisoba for Mike. I decided to play Food Roulette. This is a game I have invented myself where I order something at random and hope for the best. I selected an item that was only 4oo yen. There was no picture. It turned out to be yakisoba with fried meat. I think the fried meat was octopus tentacles based on what I saw when I bit into it. But I have no idea. I didn't win, but I also definitely did not lose food roulette. 4/10

We wanted to see if McDonald's had any Japan-specific foods, but the menu was the same. I had an egg mcmuffin. 6/10

At Tokyo DisneySea, I had the Toy Story Special for lunch at the Mexican restaurant called Miguel's. It was not in any way Mexican, but it tasted alright. 6/10

The rice was a little Woody, though.

We found a tiny shop that served gyoza and ramen, my two favorite Japanese foods. It was excellent! 8/10

One of the very rare breakfast restaurants in the entire country, Jade5, almost killed me with a garnish of rosemary in my cranberry lemonade. We made it through, because I clearly saw it before I drank. 2/10

Before we were presented with menus.

Shabu-gen. Marshall's parents recommended this place, and Marshall and Mike had been there before. It's just Japanese hotpot. However, since the last time the Hurson family went to Shabu-gen, they decided to shift their clientele for a more, upscale, customer base. Over $100 bucks a person for me to cook my own food. Admittedly, there was more food than one person could eat, but since taking home leftovers isn't a thing in Japan, we actually just ate until we felt sick and still skipped dessert. However, I did eat truffles (which kinda tasted like dirt) and actual gold leaf. Can't say that I'll ever be doing that again. 6/10

GOLD LEAF

Had bento on the Shinkansen. BTW I love the Shinkansen. Train travel  (esp. bullet trains) is the way to go. Get on it, America! 8/10 because of the amazingness of the train

In Hiroshima, we went to Little Mermaid Cafe and ate pastries. 8/10

In Osaka, we visited a dedicated ramen shop and it was way better than the ramen I eat at home. 9/10 I also tried some Japanese candy from the convenience store. It was called Crunky. It had similarities to Whoppers, but without the satisfying sizzle. 3/10

Starbucks serves a Peach Milk Tart, which tastes just as confusing as you'd think. 4/10



I tried potato chips and it turns out they were butter flavored. Not the best. 4/10

Okonomiyaki is a Japanese stuffed pancake made with egg and was birthed in Osaka, so eating it there was a treat. Marshall liked it way more than I did. Mike didn't want to try it. I tried the sampler of 3, which included pork, octopus, and corn. 4/10 Marshall had Hiroshima style, which included noodles. 6/10 for Hiroshima style

Johson burger, milkshake, Marshall, and country music

Johson Burgers in Himeji. Interestnig take on Western burgers, but not bad. Had a "craft" beer, also not bad. 5/10






Yakitori place in Himeji. JAPANESE FRIED CHICKEN IS SO DELICIOUS WHY DID NOBODY EVER TELL ME THIS BEFORE. 10/10 (All the other food at the restaurant was meh.)

Baskin-Robbins in Japan has a new flavor promotion. They sell Pikachu ice cream and it's yellow and supposed to be 3 berry flavored and it's funny that they consider pineapple a berry. I hated it. 0/10 A full minute after trying the Pikachu sample, I was trying to order my Daiquiri Ice (the girl at the counter made me sample it because she wasn't sure I knew what I was getting into. She kept asking Marshall if I was sure I wanted that flavor because it's very 'bitter'. lol) POP ROCKS began fizzling in my throat. There were pop rocks in the pikachu ice cream but they didn't fizzle right away, so I nearly choked. -5/10 for Piakachu

Thanks for reading about my food adventures!

My Scott's Cheap Flights membership is officially worth it.

Hi everybody! Back in late Spring, I got an email from Scott's Cheap Flights (#notsponsored) about an amazing flight deal. To celebrate the new route from Seattle to Tokyo NONSTOP, Japan Airlines was having a sale. A big sale. A super duper giant sale. Brace yourself.

$466. Round. Trip.

So for Marshall's birthday, we decided to go to Japan! Along with us was Michael, Marshall's brother.

August 22. SeaTac airport. Out flight was at 2pm, so we arrived around 11:30, which turned out to be too early. With Japan Airlines, they don't even open their counter for check-in until two hours before departure. They do offer online check in with your phone, but we were checking bags. So we waited in line. Check-in was super fast and simple.

My bag was the lightest at only 10.0kg. Heck yes!

After checking in, our agent informed us that the departure time, 2:05 pm, was still set and there was no delay, and that boarding would begin at 1:50. At first I thought she said 1:15. But no, 1:50.

We waited at the gate area until boarding began, at 1:50pm. The passengers on our flight were the absolute best. This is because they don't crowd the gate before it's their turn to board! This is a huge pet peeve of mine when traveling. But here, everyone calmly waited at their seat, or up against the wall far away from the would-be crowd. It was so smooth and easy and as a result our flight left on time. I repeat: our flight left ON TIME after the boarding process began 15 minutes prior to departure.

Us, having boarded the plane in 10 minutes.

Once on the plane, I noticed the windows 1) were bigger and 2) didn't have a shade. Beneath each window was a button and you could choose how dark to make your window. This was really nice. The crew controls the windows mid-flight to simulate night time, which was excellent on the return flight when sleep is necessary, but a little challenging on the Westbound flight since we needed to remain awake to avoid jetlag.


The lavatory had a bidet. I was not brave enough to try an airplane bidet.

We landed in Tokyo at 4:15 pm on Friday afternoon.

Something is starting to look familiar...

After our adventure at Hot Water Beach, we slept soundly and arose the next morning to drive to Auckland, where we said farewell to Marshall's parents and brother. Marshall and I spent the afternoon with my college friend Kirsten. It was the break we needed!

The following morning we drove up to Paihia, a cute town in the Bay of Islands. The next two days were nearly identical to the two days Marshall and I spent in Paihia in 2014. We took a coach tour up to Cape Reinga, the northernmost tip of New Zealand. It is at the point where the Tasman Sea and the Pacific Ocean meet, but do not mix. The Maori people believe that it is here that the spirits of the dead leap off the earth to return to their ancestral home. It is a very special and sacred place, and I enjoyed returning there (while I'm still alive).



We then went sandboarding! I forget how hard climbing a sand dune is.






Our final excursion of the trip was to take a cruise through the Bay of Islands to Hole in the Rock. The hole is quite small, and sometimes the water is too rough for a ship to pass through. Our Captain said that if he doesn't feel 100% confident in his ability to get us through safely, he won't do it. But, he could get us pretty close for some pictures.





Then, as we were starting to back away from the hole, the Captain punched through!





What an exciting way to end our trip. Our last task was the long drive back to the airport, and then try to get some sleep on the 14 hour flight back to Vancouver.

Hobbitses and Hauntings

A short drive from Rotorua is Hobbiton, the set used from the Lord of the Rings and Hobbit movies as the Shire. I'm explaining this to anyone who might not know, but I know you all already know this.

Our tour was at 1pm, so we had plenty of time to get up, pack, and get there.

Really, words don't describe how neat Hobbiton is, so here are a bunch of pictures.



After Hobbiton, we made the rather long drive to the Waitomo Caves Hotel, situated within a km of the well known Waitomo glow worm caves. I know, I usually find a cool alternative to some of these really touristy places, and last time I went to NZ I did. I went to a family-owned farm with a cave on the property, paid them $20 USD, and they let me and Marshall traipse around and see some glow worms. BUT there are three caves in Waitomo, and people have said that this experience is really worth it. Also, Marshall and Nolan went black water rafting.

What is black water rafting you ask? It's inner tubing down a river through a cave without lights. It's not for me. Not even a little bit.

Wait! Before I go into details of my awful, terrible, no good time in multiple caves, I need to go back to the hotel. You see, our wonderful travel agent Audra warned us when she booked that the Waitomo Caves hotel might not be as comfortable or as nice as the other hotels. We were expecting a little roadside motel or something similar, but when we pulled up the driveway we were blown away, in a good way. This hotel was spectacular! It was a very old mansion and clearly used to be a fancy resort for very wealthy New Zealanders a hundred years ago, and now it's a moderately priced hotel. It was so fancy and magnificent, sitting on a bluff overlooking the valley that leads to the caves. We couldn't wait to get inside.

Then we went inside.

This place is the Overlook Hotel. I'm not kidding. It's legit haunted. If my uncle started running around with an axe I would not have been surprised. Looking back at the outside of the hotel, it looks like the Overlook so I don't know how I let myself be fooled right away.





The next morning we went to the caves. Marshall and Nolan did the rafting while the rest of us did a tour of two of the caves. The first cave, the Ruakuri cave, was a typical cave, so naturally, I hated every second of it. I spent twenty minutes silently crying while everyone else oohed and ahhed about cave walls. The only interesting structure in the cave was the ribbon stalactite, which I had never seen before, despite being dragged around caves on multiple continents. Ribbons form when the general shape of the cave is an A-frame, so mineral-rich water runs down the wall before dripping, creating a ribbon or curtain shaped stalactite rather than a cone.




The second cave in our tour was the famous Waitomo cave. This is the cave with the glow worms. Except at first it's just a regular cave. Admittedly, the cavern was much larger, so I was less in a panic as I was during the Ruakuri tour, but still nothing of note. To exit the caves, we climb aboard these little boats and silently sail through a very small cavern, where millions of glow worms light up the ceiling like constellations. That was pretty cool. We had to remain completely silent or else we might hurt or even kill the worms. The boats captains pulled us in the dark on ropes so as not to even disturb the water.

We finished our tours around the same time as Nolan and Marshall finished theirs. We piled into separate cars and made our way to the Coromandel Peninsula. My car stopped at the Alphra Lavenders Farm. We met a friendly man who owned the farm with his wife as an after-work hobby. We love supporting local businesses, so we bought a few lavender products and explored the grounds a bit.



We made it to the Coromandel just in time for low tide. That sounds like a weird time to want to arrive at a beach, but on the Coromandel is a beach called Hot Water Beach. Underneath the sand lies a natural hot spring, and at low tide, if you dig a hole, it will fill with hot water and you can have a personal hot tub. Mom said this turned out to be the highlight of the trip for her, so it's good we made it! All of this happened in two days, and so that night, we slept pretty hard.

Weekend in Rotorua

Friday Jan 11

Another flight! 9:30 AM flight. Left for the airport around 8. Checked in at a kiosk, dropped my bag on the belt, then walk over to the gate. That’s it. Not even a metal detector.

That afternoon, we went to Te Puia, where we took a tour of the nature reserve, saw the geyser and mud pools, and participated in Te Po, a cultural event much like a luau. There was storytelling, singing, dancing of the haka, and a buffet dinner. All in all, it was a pretty full day.

Geyser

Saturday Jan 12

FREE DAY! I finally got sleep in! Marshall and I had massage appointments at 12:30 at the Polynesian Spa. If you ever get the chance to go there, DO IT. We soaked in the natural hot pools beforehand and then relaxed with and Aix treatment. The Aix treatment begins with a body scrub, and then you get a massage while they rinse the scrub away with a shower right over the massage table. It’s extremely relaxing and fairly unique.

All three of us on the chairlift

At 6:00 PM, all 9 of us traversed the entire 5km to the Skyline Gondola for more luging! This gondola was less steep than in Queenstown, which made for a much more enjoyable 7 minutes. At the top, only 7 of us decided to actually luge, but Mom and Mike had a good time hanging out at the café and taking pictures. In Rotorua, the luge track is open until 10 PM for night luge! For the normal price of 3 luge rides, you get 5 luge rides in the DARK on a lighted course. The sun didn’t set until 8:45, and Nolan, Marshall, and I had booked a private spa back at the Polynesian for that time. So at 8:00 PM, after only TWO rides down the course, we split and went to the spa.

Except Mom had the car keys with her at the top of the hill.

After a minute of panic, Nolan hopped back into the gondola and raced (at 5mph) back up the hill, where Mom was waiting at the top with the keys in her hand. The operator told Nolan to stay in the gondola and just handed him the keys as he crawled by. We made it to the spa 5 minutes before our booking. Crisis averted.

The view from our deluxe spa

After our sunset dip (it was raining) we went back to the hill and they let us finish our luge rides in the dark. Everyone else had left by then and were probably all together enjoying a nice dinner and laughing at us for forgetting the keys.

Luging in the dark is AWESOME! The course featured colorful lights in the trees and there were way fewer people, so it was a really good time. We finished our last ride right at 10:00 PM and went to Burgerfuel for a late dinner.

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Not a Road Trip (MEANWHILE....)

Wednesday Jan 9

Team B Roll (as I am now calling them) left the hotel for the airport just as the A Team rolled out to Tekapo. Upon arrival in Christchurch at 11:00 AM, Marshall, Holly, and Mark went to the Antarctic Centre. They went for a ride in the Hägglund Explorer, pet a couple of cute huskies, saw some sweet penguins, and watched two 4D movies! The Hägglund Explorer is like an obstacle course over Antarctic terrain, and it was a blast (so they tell me). All of the penguins at the Antarctic Centre are rescues that cannot survive in the wild. One particular penguin had a little blue prosthetic foot.

In the afternoon, the gang made it to the hotel and immediately walked to dinner. They decided on Thai Orchid, but when they arrived, they were 20 minutes early. Luckily, the owner was there already and opened the place up for them, serving drinks until the cooks arrived.

Thursday Jan 10

Mark departed for his tour fairly early, and drove through the mountains to Mt. Potts High Country Station, the filming location for Edoras in Lord of the Rings. It featured nice landscapes and fun facts, and that’s all I really heard about it.

Pictured: Fiona's excellent photography. Not Pictured: Fiona

The rest of the B Roll went to Kaikoura via bus. Their bus driver, Fiona, was apparently the best bus driver in the entire world because when I finally met up with them after they returned, Fiona was the first person Marshall talked about. I asked about dolphins, he spoke about a bus driver. She was really great, though. She had really interesting information, not just about the contents of the tour but loads of information about New Zealand (she used to work for the government). She also took the group to cool little stops along the way that weren’t exactly part of the itinerary.

Once Fiona brought them into Kaikoura, they finally reached Marshall’s most anticipated event: swimming with dolphins! Everyone got some glimpses, but Marshall was the one everyone wanted to be. After many attempts at talking to them and singing to attract the animals, he found the one song that brought not one, not two, but FIVE dolphins to swim alongside him. That song, friends, is the theme song to Star Trek: The Next Generation.

Everyone seemed to have a super time, and told us all about it over shawarma.

LATER THAT EVENING

Ladies night! We decided it was time to relax, crack open a bottle of wine, and pamper ourselves. Holly and I brought peel-off face masks and bubble masks, and we used tea bags provided by the hotel to de-puff our eyes. There's something about having an at-home (in New Zealand) spa night to bring out the giggles. I would highly recommend it.

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Road Trip! Part 2

Thursday Jan 10

I woke up at…. you guessed it! 6:30 AM. My alarm was set for 7, so I rolled over a bunch and pretended to keep sleeping until then. Not the greatest. We had the day to do whatever we wanted on our final leg of the road trip to Christchurch, so we took our time packing our bags and getting ready. We finally rolled out and stopped at our first tourist attraction of the day. This attraction, the Church of the Good Shepherd, was only HALF A MILE AWAY. We could see it from the restaurant the night before! Well, not really, because we weren’t seated near a window, but if we were, then we would! But we drove on up, walked over a cute footbridge so Nolan could take pictures of it, and then checked out the church.

Church of the Good Shepherd, Tekapo

The Church of the Good Shepherd was built in 1935 as a Catholic church (what whaaat!) and still functions as a church for interdenominational Christians. However, Mass is still celebrated there by the priest of the local parishes. Visitors are welcome to walk around the grounds but not go inside unless it was for worship. I was not going to miss the opportunity to use my Catholicism to my advantage, and also it’s never a bad idea to stop and pray for a bit. It was a tiny, yet beautiful, building, with a nice garden surrounding it and other grounds currently under construction.

Don't be fooled by the photo size.

Finally, we hit the road again! After an hour or so we stopped in Fairlie, at the suggestion of the hotel bartender, and had breakfast at the Fairlie Bakehouse. What a good suggestion! They had egg bakes and pastries and donuts and, my personal favorite, meat pies of all kinds. From Fiarlie, Nolan took the wheel again and we drove onward for a few hours until we were desperate for a bathroom break. After some wrong turns and differing directions from locals, we found a park with a public restroom. This wouldn’t ordinarily be a noteworthy side trip, except this part had a GIANT hamster wheel for people!! Naturally, I had to try it out. It was a little difficult to keep my balance, and stopping was a little interesting, but overall it was pretty neat.

 

We arrived in Christchurch around 2 PM. Mark was on his Edoras tour until 6, and the rest of the gang was swimming with dolphins until about 5:45. We decided to have a snack and a walk of the mall down the street before heading to Hagley Park. This park is HUGE. We spent about 2 hours there, but we only went to the botanical gardens, which comprise about a fifth of the whole thing. Oh, we also only walked around the southwest corner of the botanical gardens, so that might indicate how big this place is. Mom was in a really great place in her book, so Nolan and I left her on a bench somewhere and explored. By explored, I mean we looked carefully at the map, plotted a course, and then deviated from the course almost immediately. We found Mom again, took her phone, and then walked our route once more, this time taking  glamour shots in all the foliage.

Eventually, everyone returned from their excursions and we met up for shawarma for dinner.

Road Trip! Part 1

Wednesday Jan 9

Woke up at 6:30. This is definitely a trend. Packed all my bags and then walked down the hill with Mom and Nolan to pick up our rental car, a 2018 Toyota Corolla. I was elected to drive said Corolla up the treacherous hill back to the hotel to get our bags and say goodbye to the rest of the group. If you’ve been following my blog, you might remember that the last time I drove in New Zealand, I was in a high-speed car crash while turning into a gas station. Needless to say I was a little bit nervous terrified. By the time we drove the three blocks up the hill, I was SHAKING. But, I didn’t hit anything or anyone and nobody hit me (which was what I was worried about tbh) so Mom and Nolan both voted that I drive the car all the way out of Queenstown. Great.

 

We packed up the car and headed out. After 5 minutes, we stopped at Burger King for breakfast (even though I had already eaten) and then continued on our journey.

The nice thing about road trips is that you can go where you want to, when you want to, and you can take as many stops as you need. And since we were driving through the heart of New Zealand wine country, we made sure to stop at a nice place for lunch. Carrick Winery—a delightful little place in the Bannockburn area of Central Otago—was one such place. The grounds were GORGEOUS, the views STUNNING, and the wine DELICIOUS. Oh, they also grow olives and make their own olive oil.  For lunch we sampled the cheese board and bread with olive oil, accompanied by Chardonnay, Riesling, and Pinot Noir Rosé. We really enjoyed ourselves.

Lunch at Carrick Winery!

I will say, however, that although the olive oil is great, the olives themselves are not so much. They provide olives with the cheeseboard so I ate one. First, not a fan of all the really crunchy seeds. Ew. Second, it was SO SOUR I thought my tongue was going to burn right out of my mouth. I ate only half of an olive and called it good enough.

After Mom drove us out of wine country, we pulled to the side of the road so Nolan could give it a go. First trip out of the country and I’m already making him drive on the left side of the road! Watch out Daytona, because Nolan is a driving expert! But in all honesty, it was probably a little scary for him. I could ask him, but he’s sitting across the room from me right now and it’s just too much work.

Lake Pukaki

We booked it all the way to the Mt. Cook visitor’s center. We pulled into the parking lot at 4:30; the center closes at 5:00. Close one. It didn’t really matter though, as low clouds had come in and the mountain was completely hidden behind a thick layer of fog and rain. But Nolan got to drive over some neat one-lane bridges, and we did see lake Pukaki, which was the most beautiful color of blue I had ever seen in my life. The hue is caused by glacial flour, which is finely ground up sediment caused by millions of years of pressure and ice movement. However you think about it, it makes for some pretty water.

Mt. Cook? Somewhere in there.

We finally reached our destination for the night, the Peppers Bluewater Resort in Tekapo, around 7:00.  If you ever go to Tekapo (and you should!) get a dinner reservation early! We had to wait until 8:00 to eat, and by the time we did, we were famished. Without spending too much time reading the menu, we ordered what looked the best and waited. The waiter brought out utensils for us quite ceremoniously, which intrigued us as to what kind of establishment we entered. Then our food arrived, raw, on a burning hot stone for each of us. My stone had venison, beef, and lamb, and Nolan’s had 400g of beef. Mom made the mistake of ordering chicken, which meant she had to cook her food quite a bit longer than the rest of us. Regardless, she ate it all and didn’t seem to mind the taste.

Our hotel room, the pond, and the view of lake Tekapo

After dinner, Nolan had a nice long soak in the very large bathtub (sorry, no pictures) while Mom and I watched some TV. We went for a drink at the hotel bar, and hung out all evening. At around midnight, the clouds broke and we could see some stars, so Nolan and I walked down to the shore and went stargazing for a bit, but it was already so late and we were pretty tired, so we were back at the hotel by 1:00 AM, ready to sleep.

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I don't know what day it is anymore.

Monday? Jan 7

Nothing staves off jetlag like waking up at 6:30 AM to go on a day tour! Hooray! We spent 4 hours driving via motor coach to Milford Sound, where we boarded the Milford Mariner for a 2-hour tour of the fjord, because Milford Sound is a fjord, not a sound. After returning to land, we boarded our coach and made the long trek back to our hotel, arriving just after 8:00 PM. It’s not very exciting to talk about if I’m being honest, so I’ll let the breathtaking photos describe the day.

Hanging valleys are in no short supply in NZ

 

Yay for selfies!

Tuuuuuueeeesssdaaaaay? Jan 8

Finally, I get to return to my usual self and wake up after 7:00 AM! Except Marshall wanted breakfast at 6:30 so he woke me up then. Maybe this trip will turn me into a morning person...

We took another coach (for only about an hour) to Glenorchy. The ride was…a little dicey. The driver, Klaus, warned us that the gears were tricky on this particular coach, which we found out first hand while going up the steepest hill in the area. Klaus came through for us, though, and we only ended up rolling backwards a few meters.

In Glenorchy we changed into the gear provided, which included a wetsuit without sleeves, the hottest and most uncomfortable plastic bag of a jacket, and a life vest that was far too big to stay on my body if I fell into the water. It all turned out okay once we boarded the jet boat, though. What a blast! Tight turns, high speeds, spinning in circles as we flew on the top of the waters of the Dart River made for some crazy hair and even crazier laughs and cheers. 

Our canoe was the best.

After what felt like 5 minutes, but was more likely an hour, we arrived at the site of our next adventure: funyaks. What are funyaks you ask? Well, reader, funyaks are inflatable canoes that take teams of 2-3 people downriver gently, without much paddling (unless you were my boat or any of the boats in our group without a guide). But Catherine, why are they called funyaks instead of fanoes? I have no idea, reader. I’m not sure the Kiwis know the difference between a kayak and a canoe, because they definitely kept calling our canoes kayaks. Oh, well.

Most everybody else. Not pictured: Mark

A very cool cavern we paddled through

We returned to the hotel around 5ish. Despite wearing sunscreen (ALL DAY EVERYDAY), quite a few of us were a little pink, and a couple even more so. That NZ sun does not quit. It did not help that we kept falling out of our boat every time we needed to find shore.

Mmmmm.....ramen.

We ate dinner at Hikari, a Japanese restaurant, which was pretty good, and then for dessert we visited Cookie Time, a magical place that serves raw (RAW!) cookie dough like ice cream in a cup, and makes milkshakes and also serves baked cookies. It was super yummy, but also don’t get two scoops of anything because it’s just TOO. MUCH. I went to bed happy and fed, ready for whatever tomorrow had in store for me.

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