Wednesday, August 11, 2010

August 9: Two years of marriage celebrated

We woke up on the day of our second wedding anniversary feeling relaxed. We exchanged gifts before breakfast. Bill gave April a Hepburn tartan (modern) print wool scarf. Not appropriate for this weather but it will be very nice in the autumn with a wool coat.  April gave Bill cufflinks and button stays.
We went down to breakfast and then went back up to the room and had a nap wherein we were awakened by the knock at the door; we had to vacate the room for the cleaning people at 10, although 11 was supposed to be cleaning time. So we decided to wander through the shops of Noboribetsu. We had lunch a little before noon and ran into the same problem of finding somewhere to eat because it was early and it was a Monday (in Japan shops are often closed on Monday). We ended up at an inn with a strictly Italian menu. We wandered some more looking at all of the crafts available from ceramic fat cats, to wood carved owls, to statues of bears. There are beautiful ceramics  and crafts here. Bill was most fascinated with the umbrellas shaped like sword scabards. The Japanese have a way of making anything look cute. Hell Valley is named for its hot bubbling streams and lakes that emit sulphur and has several statues of devils around but they are mostly comical looking and the merchandise available is particularly cute with little devils bathing in the hot springs and towelling off. We went to a shrine up some steps and rang a bell and made wishes for our anniversary. We then had ice cream infused with honey at a shop that sold honey.

We returned to the hotel and Bill napped while April journaled. We then relaxed in the lobby with water and listened to the stream that flows by the hotel. We wrote anniversary post cards to each other as we did not have material to make cards for each other as we usually do. We also gave our friend at the front desk a Canada flag pin.

We had dinner and were again given hot pots when other tables were not. It was lamb this time and Bill enjoyed both. (BaaaaBaaaa).

We went to the baths after dinner and spent an hour there after we packed. We returned to the room and wrote these latest blogs and went to sleep.


Cleaning hands at the little devil shrine
Sheep go "baaa"

Relaxing like a fox

Horses go "nay neigh"

Wedding anniversary #2


1 comment:

  1. Happy Anniversary! Love the kimomos... You look like you're surviving the heat well enough. If it's any consolation it's pretty hot here these days too (I'm loving it!).

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