Emma and I are going on a little road trip today

We're in Iwaki, Fukushima

Today's adventure is sponsored by the Reconstruction Agency of Japan

I've very excited to work with them to help promote north Japan

So we're gonna be exploring the coastal area of Fukushima today

It's known as Hamadori

It's actually a part of Fukushima that I don't know very well, so I'm pretty stoked about it

There are lots of Pokémon themed things in the area

We're gonna go hunting for some manholes and go to Japan's first Pokémon park

Which looks super-cool, it just opened up a couple of months ago

Haven't seen it yet so I'm excited for that

And then we're gonna be staying at a ryokan, and it's gonna be awesome

Emma: Yay!

Sharla: So, this morning, I took the Hitachi limited express train from Sendai

It took about 2 hours to get here

That train line was actually closed down for 9 years after the distaster in 2011

because the was so much damage between Sendai and Fukushima

that they couldn't open up the line

and it just opened again, I think, in the spring of 2020,

so the train was brand new and it was super-nice

It's a good way to travel between Tokyo and Sendai

if you want to stop at different areas that the Shinkansen line doesn't stop at,

so, yeah, that's an option for you, if you wanna come up to north Japan,

but yeah, our first stop today is a Pokémon manhole, so, let's go!

Alright, we've made it to our first location

This is Yotsukura court roadside stop

We'll probably be popping in after to grab some snacks

But, the first manhole is here

So, the Pokémon of Fukushima prefecture is different than the one in Miyagi

You guys probably noticed that there was Lapras on all of the manholes in Miyagi

In Fukushima, it's Chancey!

Super cute!

Yay!

Emma: Is Chancey in Japanese "Lucky"?

Sharla: Yeah

Emma: It's so cute! Sharla: It's "rakkī" in Japanese

Sharla: So that's why they chose this as the Pokémon for Fukushima

because "fuku" means "lucky" and Chancey's name

Chansey's name is lucky in Japanese so you'll see a theme of lots of Chansey stuff here in

Fukushima. This michinoki is so cute there's lots of little hand made decoration

all over it. Is that Pikachu? They have a Chansey vending machine! I thought that was just a Miyagi Lapras thing.

All right lets pop in to the Michinaki and see what they have for sale. It's a real nice one.

Frozen cream pancakes.

So many different types of ice cream.

Oh this looks cake looks really good! Might need to get one of those.

Fresh blueberry jam. I think this area is famous for blueberries. They have lots of blueberry products here.

Hand made andonutsu. So An is like the Un from Uncle. With sweet red bean paste inside a donut. Its like really good.

What is this? (laughing) What is it? It's so cute. Is this coffee?

I feel like I need to get that. (laughs)

Friend: Yeah

(laughs) Do they have any other cat ones?

Friend: They have the yellow brand.

(laughs) Look at this one!

Friend: Oh WOW are they all different?

Yeah!

This packaging is amazing!

Friend: Oh wow!

(laughs)

Friend: I'm, I'm personally a big fan of this one.

(both laugh)

I love this michinoeki. There is so much cat stuff here.

And I love how its like slightly derpy.

Friend: Aw these are awesome!

They're really cute! Oh and they're kind of like matching but different! Friend:I like how they're different! Both: Yeah

I'm suppose to be buying lunch but I found a bunch of sweets (laughs) instead.I think there's a restaurant across the road though!

They have a huge food court here. There's so much to choose from. There's usually not this much at Michinaki.

They got some zaru soba. I'll probably get that.

(music plays)

That was delicious. We are gonna pop back into the car

We're gonna check in now and probably just chill for a couple of hours before dinner.

603, this is us.

Oh wow.

It's a lot bigger than I thought it would be.

Alright, let me give you guys a quick tour

Here's where me and Emma will be sleeping, futon-style.

Got a TV...

...fridge...

...and a view of the forest.

This little shrine over there I wanna go check out later.

Aw, this is cute.

The smell of the tatami is so nice. I love it.

These are yukata if we wanna go use the onsen later.

will come to you!

Sharla - that's so cute Emma - ghostbusters, that's really cute.

Oh cool, a little map of the area.

Their local dishes.

And over here is the bathroom.

Oh! And there's also a shower room, sometimes at Onsen Hotels, you don't get a shower like this, and you have to go down and use the public ones.

So, that's good. I'm glad they have one.

And that's it, that's our little room for the night.

We're just going to chill in the room for a bit, I think we've got an hour to kill.

And then we are going to go downstairs, and they are going to show us their onsen area.

I don't know if we will go in before dinner, because we have rented the 'Kashkade' bath for afterward, so we will probably just wait till then.

But, I wanted to show it to you guys anyways, so you see what the facilities are like here, but, it's a really nice yukan and it's super quiet today.

The elevator has a corn seat. It's so cute!

Emma - Corn Seat, Corn Seat! Sharla - It's pretty comfy. Hahaha.

We're um, heading to see the bath now. It looks so pretty, I looked it up online.

It looks really nice.But, like I said, we'll probably not get in. We'll just film it and show you guys what it looks like.

And then we'll have the private ones on later.

This is so weird, oh ha, I've never been in a yokan that has a tunnel.

Sharla - Wow Emma - What is that?

Worker - *Response in Japanese* Sharla - It's really nice

Sharla - Oooh, are those massage? Worker - *Responds in Japanse*

Alright, we're going into the men's bath. Which obviously normally wouldn't be allowed.

But we wanted to take a peek at the outdoor baths that they have, and for the women's one, you actually have to like, enter the water if you wanted to go to the outdoor baths.

So, the men's ones you don't need to do that. It's really spacious.

It's so big

Awww the outdoor one looks so cute!

Sharla - Ahhh, it's so pretty! Isn't it nice? Emma - So nice! It's beautiful.

Sharla- Yeah. Emma - it's really peaceful.

So, the women's is on the other side of this, and it looks similar, I think it was a bit larger than this one.

This onsen is very English speaker friendly, the staff are very good at English and all the notices have an English translation as well.

Which I don't see very often in Yukan, so that's nice.

We're going to go use the foot massage now, I've never used a foot massager like that.

So they have a reflexology chart here, that tells you all the different points on your feet, that correlate with other parts of your body.

These are all different like organs here, so they say if you have some kind of like health problems in those areas, you should focus on massaging that part of your foot.

Sharla- Are you ready? Emma - Yeah, let's do it!

Sharla - This ones on, Whoah! Emma - Ah! haha.

Sharla - This is really strong vibrations. Emma - Okay. Wow! Hehehe.

What does this button do? Whoah!

Sharla - Okay it was on max. Emma - Oh?

Sharla- Woah! Emma - Ah hahaha!

Sharla - I don't know what I think about this, I don't, Ow! that kinda hurts!

Sharla- My feet are killing me, I just got back from skiing. Emma- Oh no.

Sharla - I'm going to try low. Emma - It's just vibrating so intensely.

Sharla - Low's kinda nice. Interesting, it says you can use it for other parts of your body. If you want to like, lie your legs across it or something. To like massage your calves. Emma - *Yelping in background*

it kinda tickles. (look mine's like rocking(?) away) yours is moving across where is it going

ok that's enough of that

oh god it feels so weird when you stop it. ahhhhh it feels so weird. ...I don't like it

(that's like) doesn't it look creepy (it looks like really freaky)

, like it's going to grip my spine and rip(?) it out of my body)

Left. Ah, it's so cute!

This little Izakaya is so cute, the guy that owns it is really sweet

he's just preparing some dishes for us - his recommendations, we don't know what he's going to serve us.

And he gave us some daigaku imo as an appetizer

I've still never found out why these are called daigaku imo, which means like "university potato"

They're like a sweet glazed potato. It's a dessert, they're quite sweet.

Um, yeah, I don't know where the name comes from. If you know, let me know in the comments!

It's so good!

Yeah! Edamame!

Hot, steaming edamame!

And they've given us some local sake as a gift.

I am a sake pro now that I did that sake course for a week, so.... Yeah, I'm really excited to try this actually, Fukushima has some really nice sake.

I've always felt that Fukushima has the most delicious sake out of everything that I've tried, so, yeah, this should be really good.

Cheers!

But under my eyes is black like a panda

My camera has a function that'll make your skin look pretty, so your skin is bright.

Ok, I gotta show you guys something cool

So these are grilled shiitake mushrooms, very nice.

We've been squeezing lemon on them and then putting salt on them but not any salt...

I've never seen this before and I'm just so amazed by it, I don't know if you guys will have seen it

It's called Yukishio (snow salt) and watch -

It's...

It's like icing sugar

Look at it - powdery salt, it's so great!

It sticks so well to the food, it's genius! Why doesn't everybody use this on everything?

So, I showed you guys Agedashi tofu the last time I went to an Izakaya with Natsuki and Chris and I'm getting it again today! It's my favourite!

I'm going to have a recipe down in the description box, so check that out

And you should really trying making it at home because it's super easy to make and I feel like it's the type of food that anybody would like

It's like a really subtle flavour but it's super tasty.

Even if you're not a fan of tofu, I feel like this is like a good way to start getting into it, I think you'll like it

So we just finished dinner and we told them that we're going to check out that onsen shrine

And he's like "you gotta make lots of noise while you're there to scare away the ghosts"!

Thank yous o much for dinner!

Get home safely

Ready for the ghost shrine?

Oh yeah, baby!

It's so nice

Aww, it's got little benches

That's so nice! How warm is it?

Oh! It's like the perfect temperature!

Is it?

It's really nice

That's so cool

Here we go - Onsen Shrine!

Here it is! Haunted Shrine

The Onsen water coming out of the rock! That's cool!

Woah! That's awesome!

Wow

Let's climb the stairs

That ghost has stayed in the bath for too long!

Scary clanging noises

This is quite creepy at night!

Oh, there's no onsen water

Aw, that sucks

Maybe cos of corona stuff?

Maybe

That's sad

I guess this is the foot bath place

-Ah, it's beautiful.

So pretty.

[footsteps]

It's too bad there isn't a little...

foot bath running though.

but that's alright.

We're going to head back to the Onsen.

We've got our 'Kashikiri' bath

our private bath for the evening.

Alright we've changed into our 'Yukata'.

And we are about to go in our private bathroom.

I don't know what it looks like.

I haven't seen any pictures of it.

[door clicking]

[door sliding]

Oh, there's a whole like room to get ready.

Please don't be super hot!

[nervous laughter]

Oh, s**t!

[laughing]

It's really hot.

-Nooooooo!

Ahhhhh!

There's a hose here?

I'm assuming...

...this is for making it cool if you want.