Allow me to introduce you to....SAPPORO
Sapporo Info and Festival History
Sapporo is the capital of the northern Japanese island of Hokkaido. Although the city hosted the 1972 Winter Olympics (a first for Asia), it is perhaps most famous for Sapporo Beer in the eyes of Americans. Throughout Japan, it is also famous for its seafood and miso ramen.
A healthy helping of miso ramen (left) and some Sapporo beer via the hotel's alcohol vending machine. "Sapporo Classic" is served exclusively on Hokkaido (Kate had the little beer).
On a normal day, Sapporo stands as the 5th largest city in Japan (1.9 million people). However, during the Sapporo Snow Festival (Sapporo Yuki Matsuri) its population more than doubles. This year, 2.4 million people showed up to participate in a world class exhibition of cold weather sights/activities. To put that into perspective, that is more than the ENTIRE population of New Mexico entering and exiting this single city in the span of one week. Yowza!
Sapporro Yuki Matsuri started in 1950 when high school students built some snow sculptures in one of the city parks. Word about the event didn't really get out until the Japanese Self Defense Force helped by building massive snow sculptures in 1955. Now it is host to roughly 250 ice and snow masterpieces, some of which are bigger than houses. In order to prepare for such a huge event, a mind-boggling 325,000 tons of snow is brought into town to start building the sculptures a month in advance. However, in addition to slack-jawed gawking, people can find all manners of winter entertainment including, skating, curling, sledding, bamboo skiing, concerts, ect, ect , ect!
Ice Sculptures
Chelsae got the 4-1-1 about the Sapporo Snow Festival waaaaay back in the summer. We quickly realized that if we wanted to do this, we would have to commit early on. So we booked our hotel waaaaay back in September (many hotels were already full). Upon arrival in Sapporo, it was apparent that our planning had paid off in a big way. Our hotel was only a stones throw away from the main ice sculpture display area.
Looking down ice sculpture road (left). The Haines standing in front of an ice display with real fish and crab frozen inside the blocks (right).
Mobile Suit Gundam. From a popular Japanese anime series.
This guy is a man's man. Notice the ridiculous amount of ice shavings in his hair/face.
We caught a fish THIS big.
Giant peacock. I have nothing else to say.
After making the rounds we went back to the hotel, toasted to the town, and hit the hay. The next day was gonna be a big one. To see more photos from the day, click here.
-Seth
P.S. To hear a more about our preparations for our trip, read Matt and Chelsae's blog by clicking here.
February 23, 2011 at 11:16 AM
AWESOME! Love the ice sculpture with the sea creatures. And the Skin Walker credit.
February 24, 2011 at 5:02 PM
I'm glad you caught that. If you click on the link for extra pictures you will see more pictures of the sea creature ice sculpture. There are some where you can see frozen fish blood in the ice.