Friday, June 30, 2006
The observatory on a hill.
Back to the pension for dinner, we finally got to see the rest of the pension. Total of 5 rooms and 5 set of guests. Aside from us, got a mother and teenage daughter, 2 aunties and 1 lady, a couple and their young child, and 2 OLs. The teenage daughter had this indifferent look and at the end of dinner slumped on her chair. LOL... pretty cute.
Dinner was served by Reina (at the dining room downstairs), the wife while the husband (unknown name) cooked. She can speak pretty ok English while the husband cannot. I read on some other blog that during peak period in summer they will hire girls from mainland Japan to help. We ordered a bottle of their house-label beer for Y600. I noticed the other tables all ordered the Furano wine. Dinner was pretty ok. Not the best western food I've eaten but it was ok. Very homely.
Tomte Rum labeled beer to kick off the meal. Very fruity taste.
Dinner at Tomte Rum. Clockwise from top left: Appetizer plate with wild vegetables, squid, cheese & crackers. Bread. Salad. Potato gratin. There was also a soup not pictured.
The main course. Breaded chicken fillet. A little too much breadcrumbs.
After dinner, I got some band-aids from Reina. Oh yeah, actually since the second day or so, I had blisters behind my ankle. Blame it on those shitty Timberland shoes I bought for half-price at Taka. Not going to buy cheapo shoes anymore! It was quite painful coz the shoe kept dugging into the back of my heel. Anyway as I was to find out the next day, bandaids does not solve the problem. Anyway, we also informed her that we are going out early next morning (4am) to catch the sunrise and asked her what time she wakes up. Er... apparently 6am. Haha... well anyway she said we could just open the door and let ourselves out. Japan is damn safe la. In Abashiri, the Pension Lamp had no lock at the front door at all lor. In fact I don't see any gates anywhere either.
Our cosy bedroom. The whole house was made of pine wood.
After dinner and relaxation in the room, time for a soothing bath. OMG! The bathroom is like the most advanced I've ever seen in Japan (and that's speaking alot). It has digital display to adjust ambience temperature, water temperature, and a whole lot of buttons I don't dare to touch in case anything explodes. Went back to bed that night clutching the alarm clock beneath the blankets. Don't want to wake the whole house up at 4am. :P
