11 November 2024
Somewhere new
Kanazawa to Fukui on the Shinkansen
Now I am somewhere I have not been before, Fukui. I will be here for 4 nights. I immediately noticed that there were no more tourists, as Kanazawa was mainly western tourists.
It took 35 minutes to get here on the train. I was surprised to see mountains on both sides of the station, Fukui is more inland than I realised. The station area is all new, and full of dinosaurs as you shall see.
Because it was only a short journey, I arrived 3 hours before I could check in. So now I have seen all of Fukui. But it was mostly closed on Monday's.
I did however get to see the castle ruins, which as is often the case, is now the prefectural office building.
Before departing Kanazawa I did another lap of the market. I was surprised to find out you can get upstairs and take photos from above.
I also went back to the night shrine I went to the other night in the day time, thus making it a day shrine. In the day time it has a little lake. I have no evidence the lake was there at night.
First photo of Fukui, dead grass, castle walls and prefectural office.
A historic bridge over the moat has been restored, so I took a photo through its restored historic wooden slats.
The grass is greener when the sun shines. Also there is a big shrine over the other side of the grassed area.
Here is a bit more castle walls. Weather was still great today, low 20s (celisus/centigrade, refer previous rant).
Around the new bullet train station, there are dinosaurs everywhere. They move and make noises. The bullet train only started coming here earlier this year, hence everything is its vicinity is brand new, possibly to the detriment of the rest of the small city.
I had an acai bowl for lunch. That is how new Fukui station shops are, they have acai bowls. Also it had a lot of honey on top of the fruit, which was unexpected, some would find that too sweet.
You can get out onto the roof of the new station, where there are more dinosaurs. I will at some point go to the real dinosaur museum, which is actually quite some distance from Fukui city.
On my 3 hour stroll I even found a Korean style drain to appreciate. Those mountains are surprisingly between me and the coast, although the mountains behind me are significantly higher.
Now for the 3 (three!) hotel photos. This is a dormy inn premium. I got it for under $100 a night by paying in advance a year ago. I just checked, and it is currently $250 a night. Anyway it is just a hotel room like any other, I know people hyperventilate with excitement that the dormy inns have a public bath which I wont use, and after 9:30pm will give you free instant noodles which I wont eat. Other than that, it is the same as APA, Tokyoko, Sotetsu, Daiwa Roynet etc. They do get some credit for a proper desk area with a decent chair.
Much like my last hotel, the sink is outside of the bathroom.
But the actual bathroom itself is more of your standard hotel variety. I know I said I was intimidated by the weird shower at the last hotel, but it was actually fantastic. I wasted megalitres of Japanese water.
Tonight my challenge will be to find somewhere open for dinner on a Monday.