Hokkaido!

This past week I've been in Hokkaido, specifically Hakodate but made a day trip to Sapporo. My CouchSurfing host was an English tutor who made great itineraries for things to do around Hokkaido. But one of the best parts about staying with her was that she introduced me to a lot of her friends in the area and one of her students. I really enjoyed meeting so many locals and was surprised that I was the first American most of them had met, for some of them I was even the first foreigner! So it was pretty interesting talking to them all and learning about their lives (and helping them practice their English haha).

One of the coolest things I saw was the winter festival in Sapporo where they had lots of lights decorating Odari park and even a Christmas market in the middle with traditional foods and decorations from all over Europe. It was great to see such a big event with people coming from all over Japan to see it and even people from Europe staffing the booths with their products. And on one end of the park was a tower where you can get a fantastic view of Sapporo and all the festival lights in the park.

Now I'm in Kyoto, where it's the best time to see the leaves changing color! Will try and make a post for it quicker than how long it took me to find time to write this Hokkaido one haha

(Click on the arrows to scroll for more photos 🙂)