Beam Me Down Scotty - Into Tonden Kouen

7th May, 2009 - This is without doubt one of L-kun's favourite parks in Sapporo. Tonden Kouen (park), which is some 10km drive north of Sapporo's city centre. If you haven't worked it out yet - the Japanese love the roller-slides. They're every where, and I have to say they look a hoot. Now - you may also worked out that with the coming of Spring, and my return to Adelaide, there was lots of opportunities to go out and have fun in playgrounds. So there are a lot of posts about parks. I hope that this is useful for people coming to Sapporo with young (and not so young) families. 

View Sapporo Map in a larger map

The park's main attraction is the slide... and T-chan keeps telling me that it was SCARY to go up the top (then again, she's got less of a head for heights than I do). Still, she was very proud of L-kun's courage to go up to the top and slide down by himself.

Just how tall is it?... VERY according to T-chan. I am very proud of T-chan for braving her own fear of heights to join L-kun. Well done. I can't even tell that the camera was shaking in this photo.

There are lots of other things to climb up, walk across, dangle down from etc etc. There's also no doubt that Japanese playgrounds, whilst they suffer from generally grey-ish sand, more than make up for it with brightly coloured equipment.

L-kun had a full afternoon at the park - and it has the advantage of being right next door to a very large home-centre. I would not however advise using the park as a creche. That would be wrong.

The park does however exercise just about every part of a young child... and I think that the Japanese should be very proud of their efforts to create engaging and yet challenging parks for their children. And of course - to be fair, there are also so very sad, depressing neighbourhood parks as well. But where they do it well, they do it brilliantly.

Including a little construction work for the upper-body strength.

And you can sometimes feel a little lost as to what to do next. 

I have to admit that every time we go back to Sapporo we discover new playgrounds, and each time T-chan turns to me with that wistful look, as if to say "see how much fun Sapporo is!" And indeed, she follows up that look with the words "see how much fun Sapporo is!". She's an open book, is my T-chan. Still she's right. I really have to admit that there's so many great playgrounds in Sapporo... and we haven't covered hardly any of them as yet.

It's enough to make you want to have a sit down and reflect upon things... it's been a good day. I hope however that L-kun was secretly wishing that Daddy was here to share it with him...

 On the way home... Teine-yama stands in the distance. I love Sapporo's surrounding mountains. They're not too imposing, but they embrace the city like a protective blanket.

Hokkaido Jingu - Cherry Blossoms in May

6th May, 2009 - Alas, I was already back and truly in Adelaide when the Cherry Blossoms had come to Sapporo... and Golden Week is always the time for hanami in Sapporo... and the place where everyone goes is Hokkaido Jingu. It was one year before that we had all gone to the same park to see the sakura... but that year it had largely finished already (and I was a little disappointed). T-chan took some of these photos to let me see what I'd missed. L-kun, T-chan, her parents, and Auntie were off to have a picnic! Once again I'd be left feeling like I'd missed out.   ?8-( 

View Sapporo Map in a larger map

The blooms were certainly out on the approach to Hokkaido Shrine, through Maruyama Kouen... and so were the tourists and locals alike. Golden Week (29 April - 5 May) is the peak time for Japanese to get out and about on holidays... and as cherry blossoms are due around this time in Sapporo, it's also a popular destination. Cherry blossoms first appear down in the deep south (in Okinawa) from January/February, and they'll bloom in the north (Hokkaido) in May. That means that whilst the flowering only lasts at peak for about 1 week, if you have freedom of movement then there's a good chance you can find somewhere with blossoms  during March - May.

One of the favourite things to do in Maruyama-Kouen at this point is to find a nice spot and have a bite to eat. It's particularly popular to have barbecues (which can be hired in the park).

Okaasan, Auntie-S. L-kun, Otousan

And there's never a bad time to have food - especially a picnic!

Just say Aaaaaaaahhhhh!

Just don't expect a peaceful lunch out... there's lots of people and lots of noise. There's also quite a bit of drinking that is associated with ohanami (flower viewing).

It's also a great time to go walk the dog.... ok, not everyone has a real dog to walk. However, even an inflatable dog can be a great way of meeting people. The dog was actually a gift from ojiichan to L-kun, and he loved it - and he still plays with it (though the wheels are getting a little worn out now). I also have to say, that "mixed" children are always popular in Japan... you would think they had two heads and had flown down from the moon. I get a little frustrated at the attention L-kun can get - he gets spoilt enough by his parents! By the way - if you're wondering what's that on his back... it's actually a neat little backpack/leash.

Ok - I can sense that there's a lot of people that don't like the use of the word leash when it comes to children. All I can say is that there was a time around this time when it gave mum and dad a lot of reassurance that L-kun wouldn't walk off in the crowd (especially with the 1000's of people walking around Maruyama and the trains etc). Also - they are pretty cute.

Of course - when you're at Maruyama Kouen, you should pop into see the Hokkaido Jingu. There's not much in the way of shrines - at least old shrines - in Hokkaido. And Sapporo seems to be largely devoid of them compared to a lot of Japanese cities. Once again that stems from the fact that Sapporo is relatively young (being established formally in 1868), and even though this period very roughly coincides with the steady re-ascent of Shinto in Japan, it did not appear to be reflected in the growth of local shrines.

The koinobori are an odd addition at this time of the year - celebrating Children's (Boys) Festival - which is actually the last public holiday of Golden Week on the 5th of May (the previous day).

And yes - Children's Day has to be celebrated in T-chan's household with yet another gloriously colourful cake that you find everywhere over this period.

L-kun enjoys his Boy's Day cake - the night before

Like many shrines, especially at festival time, there are any number of different stalls where you buy an assortment of foods. Yummy.

Now - I have to say, that T-chan did something funky with our Canon digicam that day (applied some sort of filter) that gave us a bit of a shock when she checked out the photos that evening. Still, there's something a little interesting (and sepia-like) about some of these photos. Thankfully she discovered this before she'd taken too many photos. Kawaisou!