The City of Nagasaki - Day One

As Kirk mentioned in the last post, we had the opportunity to spend a 3 day weekend in Nagasaki in January. It was actually on our way back to Iwakuni that we stopped by the Bio Park, but Kirk couldn't wait to post the animal pics. So here's what we did the first two days.

Here is the hotel we stayed at - Nagasaki is very Dutch influenced as it was one of the only cities permitted to do outside trading with Europe during Japan's Isolationist period.

But, here. Allow me to let the signs tell you the history.

Our hotel room. Really cute and cozy.

The hotel restaurant (that was too expensive so we didn't use it - breakfast for 2100 yen each? I don't think so!)

Since Kirk and I drove up on Saturday and didn't get in until check in around 1600, we actually didn't have an entire first day, so we explored the area surrounding our hotel for the night.

Again, you can definitely see the European influence on the architecture of many of the buildings near the harbor area.

Kirk walking up the famous Hollander Road - known for its heavy usage of foreigners back in the late 1800's and early 1900's. In fact, all of the non-Asians seen in this city were labeled as Dutch by the locals because most of them were in fact Dutch sailors.

We came across some really neat buildings (the one on the left reminded Kirk of a Southern plantation) at the top of the Hollander Slope.

 

About a mile from our hotel, you walk down into Nagasaki's own Chinatown.

These snacks are a favorite in this region. It's basically a slab of pork belly with a wasabi mustard sauce on a sticky,dense bun. Delicious! 

Kirk made me do this.

We went to Butajiro for dinner! We didn't realize that it's a chain restaurant because we have one in Iwakuni too. It's a great Japanes/Italian fusion restaurant where they serve only tapas style dishes. No one speaks English, the menu has few pictures, but EVERYTHING is only 290 yen, so we were brave an randomly picked things off the menu and of course it was all delicious!

On our way back to the hotel from dinner, Kirk climbed a ridiculously old Camphor tree. It dates between 500-800 years old. It was a beautiful old tree and HUGE. Kirk is sitting between three branches that were more than big enough to be their own tree trunks. It was dark so unfortunately, we weren't able to get a picture of the whole tree, but trust me on this. It was MASSIVE. 

Nagasaki Bio Park

Back in January, Joel and I had the opportunity to spend a long weekend in Nagasaki, a little over a four hour drive away from Iwakuni. We had a wonderful time and learned a lot about Japanese history. One day we were able to go to the Nagasaki Bio park and basically had it ALL to ourselves! It was raining most of the time so we only saw two other people the whole time we were there. It was the most amazing experience ever!! Japan trusts its citizens a lot more than we do in the US (for good reason) so this "zoo" is a lot more hands on than anything we've ever seen in the States!

We were greeted by a couple of Macaws

And a llama was out front to say "hey" to all of the guests, We were warned she may kick or spit, but she was pretty cool toward us. :)

A lot of the monkeys were hiding from the rain

I didn't have food with me, so I guess the fence board was the next best thing

LOVE the tooth!!

The Bio Park had an entire orchid greenhouse... it smelled wonderful and was absolutely beautiful!

Lemur feeding time

Penguins!!

All the sudden, it's like we're in Florida :-p

Stopped for lunch at the cafe... we were the ONLY people there besides the employees! I'm serious when I say we had the whole park to ourselves!

Petting zoo with rats, chinchillas, rabbits, etc

The park was known for its Capybaras, basically a ginormous guinea pig. They were super cute and really friendly.

This is a red panda

The damage a porcupine can do to a boot!

Hilarious ostriches!

I named him Girard... if only he was mine (I LOVE giraffes!!)

Um yes, we got to hold monkeys. They were super friendly and seemed to enjoy hanging out with us

And yes, we got to chill with kangaroos!!

We got to feed the hippos by throwing cabbage into their large mouths. They were slow but methodical. Hilarious creatures!

Guess we didn't give him enough cabbage, LOL

SUCH a fun time, made WAY cooler by the fact we basically had the park to ourselves. It's totally worth it to brave the rain once in a while. :)