Doutou (Eastern Hokkaido) DAY 3

RIMG0821After breakfast at the hostel, we headed for Shiretoko National Park(知床国立公園).

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Hikarigoke(Luminous Moss). You can see the moss from the right, but not from the left.
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Seseki hot spring(left pic) is a little too open to go in naked…Aidomari hot spring(right pic) is slightly better but still…so I just had a footbath. ^^;; My friend did have a quick dip while we took watch. The water is shockingly hot! Both of them are free.
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Had uni and rice for lunch! The one on the right has no “myouban” and tastes much much better(Myouban is an additive added to uni to keep it in nice looking shape). The uni was very fresh so I bought two packs to take back to Tokyo with proper ice pack and foam box packaging, but still they smell a little bad the next day already. Third softcream from the same shop Kaisen Koubou(海鮮工房) we got the uni, turned out to be the best in this trip. Also bought Rausu Konbu as souvenir.
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Beautiful scenery in Shiretoko.
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Though the bear alerts got me slightly scared…
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Tranquil~
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Five lakes of Shiretoko.
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The artificial tasting softcream in the souvenir shop isn’t so good.
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Oshinkoshin waterfall(オシンコシンの滝).
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On our way back to Tokyo, we bought another popular souvenir at Memanbetsu Airport: caramel sweet from Hanabatakebokujo. It should be eaten chilled otherwise it becomes too sweet…like in our case…

11 thoughts on “Doutou (Eastern Hokkaido) DAY 3

  1. Hello!

    I really enjoyed reading about your Hokkaido trip, it looks fab! I’ve made up my mind looking at your photos of your experiences now that next year I will visit Hokkaido. I especially envy all your uni eating, I love uni! 🙂 Was it expensive?

    Jan

  2. the onsens look exactly the same as those on the onsen-maniac TV programmes broadcast in midnight! haha.

    no flowers indeed, as you said! but you have good uni!
    i always thought the best uni looks nice in shape! so they have additive…

  3. Jan>
    Thanks for your comment. The uni is about 1500yen a pack, not expensive at all. We bought it in Kaisen Koubou where there are seats you can sit and eat, but they don’t sell rice so my friend went outside and bought the rice from somewhere else…you are not supposed to do that. ^^;; There is a little donburi eatery inside the shop where kaisen-don(seafood on rice) is available.

    cara>
    Seriously…the onsen is right next to the road! Really have no courage to go in~. We did go to a hotspring in a proper hotel(not free) before flying back to Tokyo though.

    After tasting the difference between the same uni with and without myouban, I realise the distinct bitter taste that I thought was the taste of uni, is actually myouban taste!

  4. そうそう!海鮮工房は持ち込み禁止です~
    ウニは我らが訪ねた日が販売開始日だった模様ですよ!

    花畑牧場キャラメル、キンキンに冷やして食べないと
    イマイチって話でしたもんねー byCAさん

  5. あれ?ウニ、販売開始日だったの?!聞いてなかった~

  6. hah?! that bitter taste is the additive?! i’m shocked!
    wait, now i recall i did see fishermen open the shell of fresh uni by seaside, and they look very nice in shape, so good uni does have good shape. i guess it means when they want to keep the good shape longer, they use additive.
    i did try the uni freshly taken out from the shell too, they’re quite salty because of the sea-water inside the shell, i thought that’s why i don’t taste any bitterness, so it’s because they’re free of additive~

  7. Yeah to maintain the nice shape is difficult I guess. If you didn’t know the difference in taste, you would definitely buy the one with myouban because it looks so much better. I have known about the additive but it is the first time I actually realise how big the difference is. I am glad we did the comparison!

  8. i guess if you don’t eat both at the same time, it’s difficult to tell.

  9. Wow so there’re many free open hotsprings here and there for everyone’s public use? What if some homeless guy dipped in there before ^^;;

    Without the additive, the uni would be watery and shapeless so I see the point. The color was so much brighter in comparison in your photo. You should have gulp them all down after you got it ^^;;;

    Those wilderness photo doesn’t look like Japan at all…you’d think it’s Australia outback~

  10. It is not Tokyo…don’t think homeless is a problem? ^^;;; The hotsprings are clean! Probably maintained by local residents too.

    I heard that you used to be able to go deeper and see more wildlife, but after shiretoko got designated as world heritage, a lot of places are closed to tourists.

    Three packs of uni in one day is too much cholesterol!! ^^;;

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