The Friday before we made our big move back to the US of A, our friends N., M., and K. took off from work to spend a day with us in Yokohama. Despite the melting heat and humidity, we walked all around town and had a blast. There were a few spots we wanted to visit, one of which was the Cup Noodles Museum, where you can create your own cup noodles to bring home as souvenir. However, when we got there at mid day, all the tickets were already sold out. It is August after all, the peak travel/vacation/tourist season in Japan. If you ever wanted to travel to Japan, avoid the entire month of August (and perhaps April, when the sakura blooms). Not only the heat and humidity would be at their highest, you will also be battling huge crowds and lines in addition to paying double or triple for everything (transportation, lodging, etc.).
Anyway, so we went ahead and had lunch first at Keawjal. Yes, again. Hey, they had beer, and K. runs on beer so that was that. After lunch we turned to the next big attraction in town - the Yokohama 2012 Dinosaur Exhibition featuring specimens (replicas) from the best dinosaur museum in the country, the Fukui Prefectural Dinosaur Museum.
Left: Hubby and N. showing off their tickets.
Right: Hubby and K.
Overall, the exhibition was nice, although teeming with screaming kids, so come mentally and psychologically prepared xD The other down side to the place was the terrible lighting. The weather was already hot, and the place was literally lit up like a movie studio with numerous spot lights shining from the ground up. It was blinding and hot at the same time. Not a good combination, I tell you.
The star of the show is this Fukuiraptor, found in its entirety in Fukui!
The co-star is this Fukuisaurus. K. made a funny joke about how "Japanese" this guy is - he even made an, "Ehhh???" face in his ID picture LOL!
Yep, that's him, the Fukuisaurus.
Giant T-Rex and its head. Occasionally, we heard kids screaming and didn't understand why. Then we went around the corner and saw this guy!
Check out how cute this little dude is!
On our way out, we spotted this adorable banner and I just had to snap a picture of it. I even checked out the website got home learned this cuddly guy has a name, Konsen-kun, as well as his own webpage, complete with free download-ables like book covers, coloring sheets for kids, and wallpapers! Yes, I downloaded some of the wallpapers :P How can anyone resist Konsen-kun? Hey America, want to reduce your beef consumption? Konsen-kun can help. Just blaster his image all around town making sad faces at hamburgers.
Of course there was a souvenir shop at the exhibition, and they were selling these T-Rex head models for your home decoration pleasure ^.^
How about this one?
This guy was not for sale, I think...
After the dinosaur museum we went for a sweet cool down at La Maison. K. was not exactly enthusiastic. He was worried they might not have beer xD Turns out they did!
I had a White Peach Tiramisu Tart and N. ordered a Banana Chocolate Tart.
The sun was setting after our tea/beer(!) session so we took a stroll along the board walk and enjoyed the scenery.
Coincidentally, Peace Boat was docking there in the Yokohama Harbor for a conference. They were the ones who brought in a team of carpenters to build the outer shed for this small shopping village in Onagawa, helping out the local businesses who were struggling after the earthquake and tsunami disaster.
A view of downtown Minato Mirai at dusk. Gorgeous, isn't it?
The lack of light turned the photo blue. No flash or funny lenses! Talk about an all natural special effect!
We wanted to go to a beer garden at the Yokohama Marine Tower but they were completely full. No fret, we were minutes away from Chinatown so options were endless.
We ended up going to Ko-cho and waited in line for about an hour before getting seated. Dinner was a feast and it wouldn't be too far off to say we all went out with a bang ^.^ Good times. Good times.
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