We had a great, but rainy, day in the Norwegian Sun port of Hakodate, Japan. Originally we were supposed to have our first stop in Kushiro, Japan but, unfortunately because of high seas during our Pacific crossing, our ship was delayed by 4 hours reaching the port in Kushiro and immigration would not clear us. Instead we headed on to our next port destination of Hakodate, Japan.
When you reach the port in a foreign country, you have to go through immigration. Norwegian Sun controls the flow by sending you out in groups by your muster station letter. Our muster station letter was K so we knew we would not be leaving the ship until at least 11:00 am. So we took our time and enjoyed a relaxing breakfast in the dining room and an extra cup of coffee. Soon enough it was time to go.
We weren’t doing any excursions so we enjoyed wandering around the seafood market at the harbour. There were all kinds of interesting thing to see at the market that we don’t see offered back home.
One of the most interesting things is the plastic food menus. Japan really has the use of plastic food down to an art form. You will find these outside of almost every little food shop or stall in most Japanese cities. It is great to get to see exactly what is on the menu before ordering. It definitely takes the guess work out of things for us foreigners who don’t speak the language!
We ventured on then and saw a Lawson store. We had researched before and knew this was a convenience store similar to 7/11 so we had to go in and explore. Convenience stores in Japan sell so much more than our Canadian stores. Aside from the usual convenience store goods, you can also buy meals to go, cosmetics and toiletries, etc.
Watch our video below to get a more detailed look at our day in the Norwegian Sun port of Hakodate, Japan.
