Resurrecting the Blog

Its been about 3 months since I updated this blog, which is skirting the edge of `dead blog` territory.

Part of the lack of posting has been time related - I`ve been quite busy lately. Another part has been dog related - since we got the dog we haven`t taken as many day trips as we used to and those were the type of thing I used to blog about here the most so without them, my blog material sort of dried up.

Anyway, I really like this blog so I thought I should post something - anything - to keep it afloat for at least a little while longer!

On the weekend Ena and I had a good day off together, which provided me with a little something to write about. October is a really great month in Fukuoka, the weather is perfect. We had lunch at this restaurant in Tenjin Central Park that is located in a historical building, pictured at the top of this post.
We had been meaning to eat there ever since we moved here 3 years ago but never seemed to find the best opportunity so we just said `screw it, we`re trying this place`. It was quite nice, they have a good lunch set which is reasonably priced. The interior is pretty cool too, very Meiji retro.

After that we cycled over to Ohori Koen where we rented a rowboat and did a half hour spin around the lake.
Ena let me take over the oars after a bit:
Hard to imagine a better place to be than in a rowboat on a pleasant lake in the park on a nice sunny day. All in all a very nice day!

Putting Stickers on Bikes and the Chiba Lotte Marine's Bus

The rainy season has finally finished and we had our first weekend with some sunny weather so the two of us headed downtown yesterday sans dog.
Ena suggested inaugurating my new bike with some stickers. So we went to the loft and I chose a sheet of 1970s style Marvel Super Hero faces:
And Ena got some penguins for hers:
I put Iron Man on mine:
and Ena put the penguins on hers:
I got a whole bunch of points on my card at Bic Camera when I bought my new bike, so we stopped there so I could splurge on some more bike swag:
My bike now has its own computer with speedometer, odometer, clock, and a whole bunch of other stuff.

We went for a pretty nice, though hot, bike ride out to Marinoa and back. On the return trip we rode past the Fukuoka Dome, where a game had just ended. The visiting team (Chiba Lotte Marines) were just leaving the stadium via their team bus as we rode by.
We noticed the crowd of fans swarming around and joined them for a few minutes:
Watching people slowly get on a bus one by one isn't a particularly entertaining activity so we only hung around for a couple of minutes.

We stopped for dinner on the way back at an outdoor patio along the river in Nakasu.
Its the perfect place to rest after a long hot summer's day:

Merry Christmas: Canal City and Ohori Koen Illuminated

Merry Christmas from Fukuoka.

Fukuoka has a lot of nice Christmas lights up these days. We had lunch at a great restaurant on the top floor of Canal City a couple weeks back which overlooked the ampitheatre, they've got a big white tree hanging there. Best seats in the house:
Kind of a nice tree, assuming its meant to be a tree:
They had some nice lights set up throughout. Candles:
Trees with loads of lights:
They've got them cascading over the vines like a waterfall:
And of course over the "canal" in Canal City:
Reindeer and snowballs floating by:
Yesterday we headed over to Ohori Koen to check out the lights on the lake there:
They had tens of thousands of lights set up on the islands in the lake. We went for a nice walk through them:The biggest tree was the most impressive:
The little ones were also nice and cute:
But the best in all Fukuoka is of course our little tree:
Ena got a Canadian advent calender at the mall. We've been opening it every day:
We've got loads of presents waiting to be opened:
Anyway, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.

Fukuoka Garden Tour Part 2

Ena and I got to complete our Fukuoka garden tour by visiting the Japanese garden at Ohori Koen which had been closed on our last visit.

Its a really nice garden, probably the biggest in Fukuoka (though small by "big" garden standards). They didn't display much imagination in naming the garden, which is literally called "Japanese garden." Even in Japanese that is what it is called (日本庭園）.

Other than that though, its great. Admission is only 240 yen. When we paid the person at the gate offered us a spray from two aerosol cans of bug repellent, which we declined much to our later regret. When you enter you are greeted with some nice trees and streams running along a path:
The path leads to the main feature of the garden, its large pond:
The path takes you around it:
You can go up a little hill covered in Momiji trees and get an excellent view of the pond from beneath their canopy:
There are several artificial waterfalls and streams:
After circumnavigating the pond we took a seat on some nice little stools overlooking it. This was where the bug repellent would have come in useful, tons of mosquitoes swarmed us and we had to move on after a couple minutes:
After that we went to the other part of the garden, which makes good use of the borrowed scenery of Ohori Koen's lake:
They've got a raked sand garden here:
And a series of winding stone pathways leading through the trees and streams:
They've also got a teahouse, but they don't seem to offer any tea service like the other gardens we've been to so we couldn't go in:
After the garden we got back on our bikes and did a little riding around Ohori Koen. Ohori Koen has my favorite short bike ride in Fukuoka. There are three islands in the lake, which are all connected by cute little bridges, allowing you to cross the lake over them. Its nice for a walk or bike ride. We stopped to sit and relax on one of the islands for a little while:
We had a nice little view, and no mosquitoes:
I think I would rate Ohori Koen's Japanese garden as the second best in the city. Yusentei just edges it out because of its really fantastic tea house and more authentic, historic feel (Ohori Koen's garden just dates to 1984). Its a great garden though, well worth a visit.

Related Posts:
- Fukuoka Garden Tour (part 1)