Picking up after the last post left off, is my post about my first time at Sapporo’s Snow Festival! We timed our Korea trip so we would come back right when the festival would start and not have to make a separate trip to Sapporo. We booked a hotel for the weekend, and although originally we had an Airbnb, everything got super expensive likely due to the spike in tourism that was going to happen. This hotel turned out to be cheaper, and was in a slightly better location than our original Airbnb booking.
February 3: We landed around 3, finished getting out of customs around 4, and arrived in Sapporo around 5. We had a reservation for dinner, but since neither of us had a real lunch and were hungry, we stopped by a nikuman place on the way to check-in to the hotel. We shared a nikuman and a zhongzi (chimaki in Japanese), and wanted to try their shumai, but they were steaming it and we didn’t want to wait.
It was a really good nikuman! Nice and juicy, and the filling was chunky and textured. I also haven’t had a zhongzi in a long time, and this savory one was really satsifying.
I had previously found a cool-looking beef katsu place, so I made a reservation for when we got back at 6:30. It was pretty empty when we got there, but hey, a reservation never hurts anyone. Honestly I was going to get one of the lower tier options, but my boyfriend decided to get one of the higher end ones, so I gave in and ordered the same, because I like good beef.
It was a really cool experience to grill the meat to how you like it, and overall I loved the meal. The table, other than wipes, utensils, seasonings, and water, also comes with a jug of hot broth and pickles you can refill for yourself. I have no idea how much the quality actually differs from each different cut of meat, but this beef tasted very good and was tender to chew. There was also plenty of cabbage on the side, and the lemon sauce, the soy sauce, and salt were all great additional seasonings.
After dinner, we went to the Animate area to browse some options for merch, and then we got boba at Sin An Ju! Read about that here.
I was telling my boyfriend about a late night ramen place that opens until 3am that I wanted to try, and then he started craving gyoza. The place I wanted to go doesn’t have gyoza, so we stopped by the Sapporo Gyoza Factory for their large gyoza again. We didn’t end up going back out that night, so no late-night ramen. Oh well.
February 4: This day was the first day of snow festival! To start off our day, we met up with one of my friends who is visiting from Okinawa for pancakes at JS Pancake Cafe, since they had a limited New Year’s Matcha Pancake, and their run was going to end on February 6 (it got extended from January 31, thankfully!).
When we were done, we went with my friend who needed to check out of his old hostel, and into his new one, before heading off to the Snow Festival venue to see all the sculptures during the day. Of the snow and ice sculpures, they were all so pretty and well crafted, and I have to respect the craftsmanship put into them, especially the really intricate ice statues. (I took a bunch of pictures, but would be too much for this post and storage space…)
After we took a look at everything in daylight, my boyfriend wanted to go to the Mandarake building to go collection hunting. We browsed a bit and spent some time there, and we got a little hungry. It was an awkward time around 2 because we didn’t have a proper lunch, but it was a bit close to our dinner reservation to get a proper meal, especially because we were going for all-you-can-eat later. I decided to go to another nikuman place I’ve been meaning to try out, as that would be a substantial snack, but not too heavy either. We all ended up getting a mix of nikuman and shumai, and my boyfriend and I split a Kaishourou set, which was a nice sampler of their main items.
The Kaishourou set, which came with 2 each of their regular pork bun, their special blend pork bun, shrimp shumai, pork shumai, and crab shumai. I’m not too much of a shrimp person, and the shrmp shumai was definitely very shrimpy, if that’s your thing. The pork shumai was huge, and very meaty. The crab shumai was my favorite (because I’ve never seen a crab one before!), and they didn’t skimp on the size and amount. The regular pork nikuman was a good nikuman, though a little mushy on the inside if I remember correctly. I do remember liking the blend one more, but that one was saucier and had much more flavor, with a hint of spice too I think. My boyfriend and I both preferred the regular nikuman from the day before, but not saying that this one was bad.
Our dinner reservation was for 6pm, so a little before that we headed out to Parco so I could get some free water to refill my water bottle (gotta love places where you can get free water!). My boyfriend requested hot pot, so we went with my friend, and also met up with a friend of his at the restaurant. It was the same place as the all-you-can-eat shabu I went Christmas weekend, except at a different branch.
I tried to make it easier on everyone by splitting the bill, but there was some miscommunication between me and the cashier, so it ended up taking a while and becoming a hassle…
Anyway, after dinner and we were all happy and full, my friend left to meet up with someone else at a bar, and my boyfriend, my friend’s friend and I went back to the Snow Festival area to go see the sculptures at night and see some of the light shows.
February 5: After spending a weekend in Sapporo, it was time to go home. We met up with my friend for soup curry for lunch, and we were going to meet up with him at the restaurant after checking out of our hotel. I suggested we go to a soup curry place that I hadn’t been to before, but is super famous and I’ve been meaning to go to. It’s a good thing we decided to meet at the restaurant, because my friend helped to save us a place in the growing line of people for the restaurant. They were also pretty efficient, taking everyone’s orders while they were in line. We eventually sat down around noon, and were placed at the counter in front of the kitchen where the cooks were hard at work and we could see them preparing everything. We got our food pretty soon after sitting down, thanks to their efficiency.
I went with a chicken base and the mushroom and bacon curry, with the normal rice, spice 0, and broccoli as my free topping. This was a really good soup curry! It wasn’t heavy at all, and I loved the amount of vegetables that were in it. I have no spice tolerance, and even at 0 it was a pretty spice-y (not hot, but spices spicy).
After lunch, we had a bit of time to kill before our bus, so I took my friend to the Shiki Marche to buy some souvenirs. Then, of course, I needed a drink to go on the ride home, and what better than Gong Cha’s new seasonal chocolate milk tea? Read about that here! After that, we got on the 1:45 bus home.
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