Hakodate, Japan Cruise Port: What to Do, Eat & See in Just One Day!

Hakodate, Japan Cruise Port: What to Do, Eat & See in Just One Day!

hi so one of our cruise port stops on our Trans-Pacific cruise was to Hakadate in Japan so we really enjoyed this stop and saw some amazing things snow monkeys giant crabs so stick around check it out find out what we liked what we didn’t like where we went and what we’d recommend so we arrived quite early in Hakadak we arrived there like before 7:00 a.m we kind of got off straight away it’s hindsight I probably wouldn’t do that i would probably have a leisurely breakfast on the ship and then get off a bit later but anyway we got off to go and look at the morning market i personally don’t really like a lot of seafood and find it really creepy but it was interesting there was lots of seafood giant giant crabs and all sorts of other creepy creepy things but anyway it was quite enjoyable oh my goodness but then we sort of had a bit of time spare uh so we worked out about the public transport system so we got the tram pass there’s a number of different options we got the one-day pass and went off and got the tram so we had to work out how to use the trams it took a little bit but once you get used to it or you know how to use it it’s really quite easy so the you get on in the middle of the tram and when you get on you can take a little paper ticket that says like where you started and if you’ve got a one day card I don’t think you need these we didn’t pick them up and we weren’t ever told we needed one but if you are just paying as you go you just get one of these little tickets so you get on in the middle of the tram and there is a board up the top that tells you how much it costs from where you know where you got on to where you are now so you you know how much you need to pay and then when you’ve finished you get off you go to the front of the tram and you pay the driver so you give him your little ticket so that tells him where you got on and you will and you pay him for that or if you’ve got the one-day pass which we had so the one day pass you just scratch out the dates it was the same as the one that we had in Hiroshima so I think they’re pretty common across Japan and and then he lets you off so the time is pretty easy it’s just one line going through the town so highly recommend doing that to save yourself a bit of money so the first place we went to was the Goryoku uh tower fortress so this is a a fortress and there’s an observational tower that you can go up we paid to do that and highly recommend it the views were stunning across the city and of the fort so this is a star-shaped fort uh and it’s massive it’s a western style citadel and it was built in the last years of the Edo period which was between6003 and 1868 and it was for the defense of Hakodate against the imperialist threats from the western powers so a few years later it became the site of a civil war between an army of the shogunut and the superior troops of the new newly established Miji government and then later after the fort lost its military importance it was turned into a public park in the 1910s and it’s really quite stunning so there was over 1,000 cherry trees were planted here so in the height of the cherry blossom season which is generally early May this park is absolutely stunning i can imagine how good it was we weren’t there for the the peak but uh it it was really lovely right in the middle of the park is the former magistrate’s office and there’s a number of buildings and statues this is really nice walking around we enjoyed that and from after we left the fort we went for our our bucket list item for Hakadate which was to go and see the snow monkeys so the snow monkeys are situated um at the end of the tram line well nearly at the end and they’re within the botanical gardens at least that’s what it says so I was expecting you know like a big botanical gardens and then you’d walk through and you’d find the snow monkeys in one section of it and it’s not like that at all so we got the tram out there as I say it was fairly near the end of the line and then we walked it was quite a long walk so I highly recommend if you did do it maybe consider getting a taxi from there like I would do that i would get a taxi at least one of the ways it was quite nice like seeing it’s just like in a kind of local residential area so it was quite interesting to see but I would certainly at least get the taxi one of the ways rather than walking both ways like we did and you get there and then the monkeys you you pay your entry fee and then the monkeys are literally just across like a little courtyard they it’s not all the way through a gardens or anything um they’re in a an area with the hotring and they’re very cute so there’s a uh like announcement that comes over the top that tells you about them about what they eat how they live uh that you know that they’ve the first ones there was about 20 of them that came over from a zoo and so the ones that are living there now are all descendants of them they have the hot springs running all through the winter they stop the springs when the first baby is born if they are breeding that year and most of them about 80% do spend a lot of time in the springs there’s about 20% that don’t go into the water at all that don’t like it but there’s no video of this i’ve just got some photos because you’re not allowed to um post the video on social media but I did take lots of video they were so cute i don’t know we spent ages and ages watching them they’re very cute uh in the springs out of the springs you know interacting with each other it was really good fun so it is in a botanical gardens as they say the botanical gardens is actually more like a greenhouse so facing the monkeys it’s just on the right hand side uh worth going into you know nice plants some um bugs and things but it’s very small it’s not what you would expect of a botanical gardens but still worth going into there we got the tram back and we went back to the main area and we went to the red brick warehouses the So the Canamori red brick warehouses they were built in 1901 the area around it is really interesting and the market was quite good we stopped off at this great petissery we had this absolutely amazing double chocolate cake thing this uh was to die for everything was as beautiful as this you can see in this bit of video and it was so yum we also did some shopping so there was a store selling chopsticks where they engrave names in them so we had seen this in Miaima Island when we went to Hiroshima and we didn’t get them there cuz we were worried about running out of time and so we’ve been looking for these ever since cuz we got some of these done for um all the kids so it was a great souvenir for the family so yeah so look out for that if that’s something that you’re interested in getting and there’s lots of other souvenirs and things to buy we had lunch just near the red brick warehouses at the Lucky Pero Burger Place because when I looked up things to do in Hackadate it came up with this as being like a local you know thing to eat i know it was a chicken burger it was okay i I personally would probably not go there again but like it was it was nice but it wasn’t as amazing as I thought it would be i don’t know it was a chicken burger so I don’t really know what I expected but yeah it was pretty good so we did of course stop into one of the convenience stores and I will do a video on these uh the Comini the convenience stores in Japan are just absolutely amazing so this is your Family Mart um 7-Eleven Lawson’s you can get everything you want there but also you can get uh food and drinks so we popped in to get drinks and then we also got some snacks in there i got the Japanese fried salty chicken which was really yummy the chicken was really good quality really nice and my partner got the curry bread which he said was really yummy as well so you can get foods like that you can also It’s a convenience store so you can also get you know foods to cook or toiletries or anything you need and these are everywhere in Japan you know there there’s one on every street corner pretty much so we spent a lot of time that’s where we got a lot of our food from it was always interesting just to pop in see what they had try something different so I highly recommend doing that and I say I’ll do another video about that later so I hope you found this video on Hackadate useful i am putting up videos from all of our port stops so through Japan and Alaska and then after that we spent some time in Canada going around British Columbia and Seattle so I also put up videos for there so please do like and subscribe if you’re interested and it really does help my channel grow and if you subscribe then you’ll be the first to know when I put up a new video so I hope you enjoyed it until next time thanks bye

Hakodate Cruise Port Adventure: Snow Monkeys, Star Fort Views & Red Brick Charm

Join us for an unforgettable day in Hakodate, Japan—one of the most scenic and surprising cruise port stops in Hokkaido! From panoramic views at Goryokaku Tower, overlooking the star-shaped Goryokaku Park, to the steamy delight of watching Japanese macaques (yes, snow monkeys!) relaxing in a hot spring at the Hakodate Tropical Botanical Garden, this day was packed with quirky charm and natural beauty.

We also explored the historic Kanemori Red Brick Warehouses for some shopping and local treats—watch to see what we bought, what we ate, and what we’d recommend!

Plus, we’ll show you how easy it is to navigate Hakodate using the city’s super convenient tram system—no Japanese skills required!

Whether you’re planning a cruise stop in Hakodate or dreaming of one, this guide has tips, laughs, and monkeys in hot tubs. Don’t miss it!

Please like and subscribe to follow my channel for more travel and cruise adventures and information.

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