Packing and Prepping

We're very excited to get back to Hakodate, but there's been a lot to get done before we leave - and there's still more yet we haven't done.

The big thing is packing - or, perhaps more accurately, figuring out what not to pack. We have so much stuff still there that our friends have very, very generously been holding on to for us while we've been gone; it's heavily skewed towards winter outfits and stuff so we will need to bring some clothes and whatnot with us, but we're not trying to double our stuff in case we do have to leave again. We're house sitting for some friends right now, which gave us the opportunity to pack up and see our current load, and it's like, three bags and two (small) backpacks, which is most definitely too much.

Figuring out where to stay was shaping up to be a bit annoying. See, last time we were in Hakodate, we stayed in a couple month+ duration airbnbs. This time, though, we're going in what I guess is more of a peak tourist season; there basically aren't any airbnbs with a solid month of availability. It's not like they're packed solid, they just all have two or three weekends filled, the odd full week here and there, and basically while we'd have no trouble staying at airbnbs the whole time, we'd have to be constantly moving from one to the next, and that just didn't seem pleasant.

We reached out to our friends in the area to see what they recommended - after all, we're only aware of the stuff targeted at Americans, they'd know about stuff aimed at locals. We did indeed get several recommendations for places to look at right off the bat - and then our friend Florence just straight-up found us a place, even went to tour it for us entirely unprompted! It's a great location, a great price, and we should be able to stay there for the whole 3 months of our tourist visas! We haven't signed anything yet so it's a little early to say we're set on housing, but it's looking pretty good!

Speaking of housing, we have officially moved out of Janine and Jeremy's place. We're housesitting for some friends for a couple weeks, and by the time we're done with that Janine and Jeremy will have some other friends staying with them - just for a week, but basically it did wind up easier for us to crash with Cassie's sister Candace for our last week here, so that's where we'll be going next.

We're getting very excited for Hakodate - three weeks!