Round The World and other travels
A frequent flyer's collection of trip diaries
This is: Japan 2018
Fukuoka food tour
Today kicked off with an unexpected panic:
during breakfast in Tully's Coffee, Bruce suddenly realised
that our train northwards was half an hour earlier than he'd
thought it was. Specifically, the departure that we had been
thinking of as the 1050 would actually be pulling out of the station
at 1020. Yikes! We returned to our room, packed in double-quick
time, checked out and boarded with only minutes to spare. Once
again, it was a Green-Car run on a tilting train. Today's trip would
retrace our route back to Tuso, but would then continue to the
Hakata Terminal in Fukuoka.
| Destination Facts: Fukuoka | |||||||||||
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On arrival, we had a walk of approximately
1km in strong midday sunshine to reach our latest hotel, the Grand
Hyatt. This formed a prominent part of the Canal City shopping and
entertainment development in Hakata. We had very good first
impressions of this hotel, and were delighted to be given immediate
access to our canal-view twin room. As it was still more than three
hours until our food tour and we'd only managed to have a light
breakfast, we decided to seek out sustenance in the adjacent Canal
City mall. I had a small bowl of Ramen with a beer.
In
due course, we walked back to Hakata
Station to join our booked food tour. There were only two more
people on the tour - a couple from Canada - plus, of course, our
guide. The tour began with something that I had never encountered
before. Everyone who has ever visited Japan soon becomes familiar
with having drinks machines every few yards along the street. But
this was my first visit ever to a machine dispensing Dashi,
a popular Japanese stock used as a basis for soups and other dishes.
Next up was a market where the focus was on fish. At one point we
walked past the window of a building where a Love FM radio
programme was being hosted live. We got a wave from the presenter,
and probably an on-air mention as well!
The
next stop was an upscale department store, and this was followed by
a fairly downmarket pub. The latter was smoky, but friendly enough -
I think! The absolute highlight of the tour, however, was enjoying
freshly cooked street food at a crowded, but very friendly pop-up
stall. Once again, this was one of those unforgettable 'authentic
travel experiences' that go beyond
mere sightseeing.
Later, the positive experiences continued when we had cocktails at the hugely impressive Martini's bar at the Grand Hyatt. It was a lovely way to end another great day, despite a rather suspect apostrophe!
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