Iwate and Sendai road trip Juneteenth weekend 2025
Okay. How’s it everybody? Today is Junth, 2025 and we headed to Sai. Sai Sai Memorial 311 Sai Memorial which is 5 and a half hours away. So, we got to use the Honda end box because my van see my van went overheat yesterday. So, I had to order a part, but fix them when we come back. But we’ll make our way with the K car. Take our time. Hope not follow us. Okay. [Music] Okay. How’s it everybody? So, we headed to um um where’s that? Miyagi Prefecture, which has um S or Sai. Sendai. And we still uh three hours and 49 minutes away. So we just kind of just just passed Tokyo City. We just we just an exit over here. So we here we parking area because uh we’re taking a break use bathroom. So, Tokyo is here and then we headed up north. Yeah. So, so yeah, we um we here at this parking area and taking a break. So, check it out, I suppose. So, we use the bathroom. So, again, we stay with G’s car, the K K car because um the van went overheat yesterday when I was driving home. I mean shoot what is the chance is that so now in order that the fan I guess the fan the motor for the fan is broken and I checked it cuz I switched to get two fans actually. So I checked it and just one of them is bad but the thing was kind of getting hot. So anyway, bathroom small area, but they get um they get like vending machines here. Not sure what that is. ETC. So they have, you know, this is the basic vending machines everywhere all over Japan. But this is this is one special one right here. Okay. Um look like katsu sandwiches. Pretty good. See, like kind of pricey though, and then this one is pretty cool. Look, sweet potato. 500 yen. Pretty good. Maybe I won’t buy. And then here, this is like one break area. So this is your standard um coffee. You get this all over. And then this is a fresh uh orange juice machine. Pretty good. Fresh squeeze room. Standard, you know, vending machine where they have drinks. And then now you get one Family Mark machine over here. And they get some pretty good stuff, you know. Family Mart snacks, you know, chips, drinks, there sandwiches over there. 300 yen. Not bad. All kind drinks, KitKat. And then this is another Family Mart machine. And then look, they get like oniri and then some bread stuff, you know. Look like the murken. I I bought this um egg curry bread. It’s pretty good. It’s pretty good. So, look, it strawberry donut look good. They get all kind stuff. Family Mart stuff. Nice. And then check this out. Like a ramen machine. Cool. Look, you can order all this. Look, you even get language English. Look. See? Look. Soy sauce ramen. Any kind. Tonkatu. Showy ramen. Chio. Soba. Chio is salt. I think salt and then you get your dessert right here. Ice cream if you like this common machine and then trash area. So pretty cool nice area. So we’re going to hit the road again. So yeah, see you guys in our next stop. Probably find one place we eat lunch or something along the way. So shoots. All right. Okay, I stopped by for lunch. Moria. This rest stop is parking area. Rest stop Moria little bit north of Tokyo on our way to Sai and we walk in and then bought this chicken. I already took one bite, but I think it’s really good. Really soft, moist. Has like one pepper pepper flavor. Really good. And then we bought this, too. mint. Um, and she got one fat chicken. Yep. That’s the fattest chicken I ever seen. Huh? Hope it’s not dry. Try to take a bite. You take a bite. It’s good. Mhm. M tastes like the meat that they brine them. You know, like on chio flavor. It’s really good. Isn’t that chicken thigh? Yeah, that’s some fat chicken thigh. Like they went fat in them. Okay. And then my feet. So this our lunch for today. Today’s um today’s Thursday, 2025. Yeah. Rice is expensive now in Japan. Like on 5 kilogram bag is like 4,000 yen. That’s double the price of what was like a year ago. Rice is really expensive now. Okay. Well, we’ll be back when we um on the road again. Okay, how’s it everybody? We made it to Sai Memorial and um parked in this parking lot here. So, we left home I left home at 8 a.m. and right now it’s 3. Well, maybe 8:30 we left, but we made stops along the way with a couple meals. Yeah, it’s pretty long drive with the K car was okay. Just had to drive slow. Can I drive fast with the K car? So, let’s take a look. So the the memorial is like right at the Ara station. Yeah. So just today’s temperature is pretty hot like right now feel like cooling down but I think the temperature is like mid80s kind of humid a little bit and uh maybe when the sun go down then might might end up being like Maybe. I’m not sure. But here is the um I think it’s over here. Yeah. Brown building is here. Oh, there’s parking over here, too. Oh, wait. This is not it. I think I got to go inside. It’s inside the station, they said. So, let’s go check out the station. Pretty nice place. Quiet over here. Let’s go check it out. Can’t see in here. Check it out. No dangerous goods. Oh, there Sai Community Center just in the station. It’s a nice station. Oh, people. Oh, what’s over here? Community center. I think it’s here. Here we go. Special exhibit. Here’s the guide book. A thick one. So see they have um all kind of reading information. I don’t know what this is. Oh, the tomography of this. Wow. I’m not sure where we are. I think there’s downstairs. Not sure. Is this it? I guess that’s I guess this the only Well, I thought it would be more extravagant. Not sure. Oh, they have a gallery. G upstairs. Let’s go upstairs. You got the camera on me. Hey. Hey. Went upstairs. Are you coming? Second floor upstairs. Okay. Oh, this. Okay. This is the This is the one. Okay. Oh, nursery. It’s a whole wall of posters messages. People on post photos are permitted. Okay. Camera. Okay. Drinks. Pictures of Sai. Check it out. Oh my. Wow. It’s a tsunami. I guess that’s the natural Again, we at the Sai memorial or not memorial but like a museum. [Music] What is it? all you people that can read Japanese. The devastation Oh man, look at all the trash. [Music] Oh, white ball. Sad. They have they have headset so you can listen to videos. Maybe it’s [Music] Not sure what this is. [Music] It’s amazing how they separate all debris or recycle and mostly recycle some kind of survey Okay. This about see you guys later. Okay. How’s it everybody? So, uh, we just went check in to our hotel. So, we stay in Sai and I I brought me some beverages. See them beverages. And um, we just been checking our hotel over here. That’s our hotel right next to the 7-Eleven. Value the hotel. Pretty cool. So, it’s like on container hotel. Pretty cool. Yeah. So, check it out. Look this some busy um city, man. How big the city? Yeah. Pretty cool, huh? Look like W Pahu W Pahu town. See the tiny businesses. Some kind of rainbow cafe there. So anyway, let’s go check it out. Show you guys the room. Yeah. But pretty nice place. Check it out. Architect architecture design. Yeah. So there umbrella stand. This is like my break room over here. Lobby area. You can hang out, get massage, chair, TV. It’s pretty cool. A coffee machine and vending machines in there. Coffee. All these machine vending smoking room. Vending machines. Look. Can buy all kind of stuff. Cup noodle. Oh, look. Snacks over here. Okay. Oh, yeah. So, just walk up to the room just down here and then turn left and then go over here and you’re going to go see what’s down. That’s second floor. So I think it’s here this laundry room. So here’s the key. Okay. Okay. Check it out. Toilet. Toilet. [Music] And then It’s the bed and then refrigerator. Oh. And then look at our magnificent view. Whoa. Man, we get neighbors. All right. container hotel maintain. Get the AC. Okay. All right. Okay. How’s it everybody? So today is um Friday Friday morning and um when we um checked in yesterday at this um this hotel container hotel. So made out of containers. So we’re going to have the complimentary breakfast today and um see how the breakfast is. Yeah. Again, this is all like containers, like mats in containers made out of the seal, the seal. Pretty cool. Yeah, all mats and containers all stacked together. And they made it like an old hotel. So, this is fuku upstairs. So, we’re having breakfast. So, here I got I got my pre coffee already. So, [Music] need to get a free coffee machine. The nice upstairs smoking room. What a nice. So, look, they open 6 to 9. So, good morning. All right. How’s it look? Grab our tree. All right. So, good morning. Nice. It’s a nice view. [Applause] toothpick. And then wait, we got um Oh, natto. This is the one. Ni. [Music] I don’t know what this is. egg. It’s the kitchen they preparing. So, let’s go take a look what they have here. Yogurt, I think. And then, um, salad. All right. Let’s get some salad. Yeah. Got to have some vegetables. Yeah. some some mouthful of pieces. Oh, look. They get fish. So, they get corn. Corn. And this is good, too. Like this. And get some of this. Little bit of vegetables. I don’t know what that is. Oh, this is healthier. Grab and then fish. white fish and egg. The egg go. Anyway, anyway, anyway is good. No matter I just I think we’re the last ones. Okay. So, what is this? Oh, meatball. I’ll grab one. and soy sauce. And then Okay. Ketchup for the egg. And then this is dressing. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, if you don’t have, you shouldn’t take I don’t know if you can put it back. Yes, man. Oh, yeah. Put the bread in the toaster. Toasting. Strawberry jam. Butter. Spoon for spread. And then um here is um Green tea. Oh, miso soup. All right. Okay, that should be good enough. All right. And then here we got Need need rice. I don’t know what a rice. So here miso soup. This spoon kind of backwards. See backwards. The spoon. Yeah. Ko. What is this? Oh, this is the rice right here. This rice. Is there curry or just rice? I don’t know. Coming soon. The curry. It says Yeah. You guys like rice? Oh yeah. Okay. Right here. My breakfast. Actually, I like all of these fish. Nice. And actually we may go on the rice of that. Okay. Okay. Well, we going to sit. Looking good, huh? Okay. All right. Eat the dakim. Thank you for the food. Thank you for the food. Okay. We’re going to eat now. So, [Music] Okay. How’s it everybody? So today is Saturday, the day after Junth. What’s that? June 19th. till June 20th. And we are here at Sendai to check out um um some kind of historic area with the earthquake. Some memorial park by the ocean. And then there’s a shrine. So, let’s go check it out. to drive our K car from home. So yeah, check it out. So So came with um Jane and his family. So residential foundation. over here. But our houses are small tsunami eroded land. It’s not that hot today. Big though. Good. It’s with this big wave. Is the beach right there though? Yeah. Yeah. Right over the B. That’s where this is where everybody was running. I think I think so. Right. Okay, let’s go check it out. So, give you guys a good view. [Music] They have restrooms over there. There’s a bell over there. Make noise. Yeah. 13.7 m. That’s huge. Man, that’s big. 40 foot. That’s big. That’s That’s big. I’m not sure. It had this wall inside. I think this was the original wall that was protected. Use it like a ramp. Oh, we got set the 20th 20. What does that say? Okay. We’re on Twitter. Pacific Ocean. Yeah, that’s why So see this man is I think that’s why contributed to many lives lost. just kind of kill off this whole flat land area. You know, there’s no mountains. Yeah. So, the the amount of water that inundated the the area, this whole city was just going to mass destruction. Yeah. So, as we was driving, as we drive through the city, you can notice that there’s a lot of a lot of new houses. So, people um I guess rebuild. Yeah. Okay. So, I’m not sure. There’s another memorial up north. So, I’m not sure I’m going to make it, but it’s about a 2hour drive now. He walked it. He walked it. He walked his tsunami memorial. So, I’d like to maybe check it out if there’s time. Why don’t Jind them like go to the um the box park? Okay, made a pit stop here. Take a break from the drive. It was a 2-hour drive from Sendai to this place we’re going. Um so the place we headed to is actually What is this? Ite. And uh we just took one detour off the highway to check out this place. And this is Minami Sanriu. They get all kinder. So I think that’s the memorial down there. You see them? But you get all kind of eeries here. Seafood and ice cream and beer. Beer. I got a 7-Eleven. That’s some store right there. Olive. Isn’t that a store? I don’t know. Is it? Yeah. So, I get like strawberries. Oh, taco pudding. Taco pudding. kind of stuff. Strawberry stuff. Wow. Strawberry sandwich cookies. Good. Taco ping. Oh my. dessert store. Premium berries, strawberry. [Music] Okay. So, see you guys after I make our way to the memorial. [Music] Okay. So, we’re still here at Minami Sun. This the food alley. And then um this is the main memorial here. So this is the overview of the area. Wow, look at that design this place. Wow. So, Minami Sanriu Earthquake Reconstruction Memorial Park over there. Wow. This place nice, man. Oh, there’s group tours. The entrance. Oh, no cameras though. cameras. There’s upstairs, too. It’s the office. Okay. So, we’re going back to the car. So, we we’ll be back when we reach. It’s about maybe 45 minutes from here. Okay. before. Okay. So, this area is Minami Sanruoku and then this is the 8271 17 2017. Oh, this is the rebuild. Yeah, this is the 3:11 2:46 p.m. devastation. Sad. Okay, so we’ll be back when we reach. Okay, how’s it everybody? We made it to Iwattate picture and this is the 2011 March 2011 memorial and we’re going to go and pay our respects here. Pray for the lives that was lost here. But going to go inside and then go um the toilet first. Yeah. So, here’s the um there’s a C view spot and then remains from the earthquake. The miracle pine tree. I think that’s the one Franklin was talking about. Let’s see if you spot a pine tree. I don’t know where a pine tree is, but see if they have Oh, here it is. The pine tree. Okay, so I guess let’s go. Um, let’s take a look. It’s like that’s the entrance over there. So, this is a pretty good drive. We came pretty far north up to So, yesterday we drove into um what’s that city we drove yesterday? Garrett getting bad. So, as you can see, as you can see, we drove from our house, which is here. somewhere around here. So for us to drive home now, it would be a 6 hour 23 minute drive, 519 kilometers. So, we’re pretty far. Pretty far. So, let’s go take a look at this uh place in here. So there’s the map of the picture. We walk San Re. So we’re right here. Oh, we came from Sai. We drove from Sai. So about a 2hour drive from Sai to here and um but that’s the long pine tree. So like they have um oh it’s like a store souvenir store. [Music] yellow kind of pizzas. Oh, strawberries. Ume. They get their own like they get their own grocery store here. They get all kind stuff and You can eat lunch over here. Huh? You can buy food. Oh, I’m going to go I’m going to go toilet. Huh? Toilet. Wait. Let’s Yeah. Right. Right over there. Oyster sauce, too. Wow, look. Oh, I want to get one of those. I’m not sure. Could be. Probably is. What is this? Oyster sauce. Oyster soy sauce. Oh wow. Must be good, huh? What you think? They must be known for the Oh, yeah. That’s what the client was saying. Mishimuran. He said that this place is known for oysters. [Music] Shapio. Yeah. Big rice. Yeah. What is this? Scallum. Got pretty good stuff here. Wow. Wow. Good, huh? I got to buy something for the office. I like I like buy stuff after we go look after we look. Okay. I um got to go toilet though. Should I look at some of these other place spots get over here? I don’t know what this is. MCI. [Music] Okay. [Music] Wow. Look at this citrus though. [Music] Oh, I’m hungry now. Okay. I don’t I don’t s [Music] Oh, yeah. Okay. So, we’ll be back then. Okay. How’s it everybody? So here at at Iwattate Takatam Matsubara Memorial Park. So here’s the official pamphlet and they have it in um English. So we’re going to check out this Miracle Pine Tree CV spot and this floor tribute area. So, going to walk out to the seaw wall over here. Okay. So, without further ado, just let’s go check it out. Okay. Okay. So, here’s the here we have the memorial. This is some great um respects to the different um people here. So there’s the Heat. Heat. What is that thing right there? Cutting the grass. Yeah, it’s cutting the grass. Wow. It’s a automatic grass cutter. It looks like that’s the housing for it. Huh. It’s funny. Oh, it’s supposed to flowers. There’s a view from So check that out. They they have cutting the grass. Hey, that’s the pine tree. This the secret pine tree was talking about this. See guys cutting the grass. I think maybe it’s cutting the grass, huh? What the heck? Again we have the prefixure. This is the memorial for the city. Tsunami of victims of March 2011. That’s the sacred tree. There’s a story behind that tree. Like the person who tried to cut it or something like that happened to the guy or something like that. Not sure. Is the camera still on? Came still. Make our way. That’s the secret tree. It’s like a tree. Heat. Okay. So, we’ll be back. Explaining. Okay. We met a local um Japanese man here. He’s very friendly guy. So, did he say okay I can 14 m.6. in the city and he shows pictures of the boat. So was this was this always here came up introduced as you know this friendly guy nice guy that’s took a picture located where where do you stay here weakawa you return to today no no tomorrow sandai we stay yeah hotel running and something stops We live in Kanagawa. He works for the US military. Oh, civilian worker. Civilian worker. Yes. What kind of construction? No, no, no. Like Tom Cruz. Yeah. Top secret. I’m I’m President Trump’s bodyguard. I’m Japanese. Japanese. Oh, Japanese. I just I don’t want to see because six six times. Oh, wow. Cuz I used to judo. Oh, nice. Captain Judo. Oh, that’s good. Yeah. Nice. Oh, yeah. Tour group. Okay. Yeah, we still here at the mate and away from the center over there and going up to that structure over there. The structure was actually here when the tsunami came and then you want to see the the water how high the water is. So, we’re going to go there. And um so our friend we met, he’s he’s our tour guide now. He’s um going to take us take us there. So, look how high this seaw wall is that they they made. It’s pretty high. kind of break break the slow down the force of the tsunami. Oh yes, no. Just up. Yeah. No, no, no, no. Yeah, look how high this wall is. Yeah, only way too. But you live in Hawaii. So I have to walk place. I don’t know where I don’t know. sister. Wow. He look I’m [Laughter] Oh wow. Fish over there. One fish. What is What is all that in the water? Look like muscles. Is that muscles? Yeah, it look like muscles are flying over. That’s all muscles. Yeah, I think that is muscles are smart. They should be able to crack open those and yet they choose not to. I never seen this ever open. Yeah. What is that? Clams or something. Wow. Okay. We’ll be back when we at the building over there. Okay. sign. Let’s see the sign and present of Kata Matsubara. It’s the beach before the disaster forest with 7,000 70,000 pine trees. Wow. Wow. This is a popular beach. They planted all these trees after after the disaster. Okay, I got to catch up with my So, we’re making our way to that structure over there. So, we’ll be back. All right. Okay. So, look like we cannot go in that area. It’s fenced off. But you can see that red sign with the line 25 m. That’s the water line of the tsunami. So, our friend that we met over here, he said that only the people that was above that water line survived. Wow. Look at the force of the water when it caused this steel structure. Man, just bend that thing like like rubber, man. Solid steel just collapsed. Unbelievable. Wow. Imagine the force of the water, man.
A memorial visit to Iwate and Sendai. My sincere condolences to all the victims of this horrific tragedy. I would like to send prayers and blessings to the survivors of the families affected.
AloJapan.com