loa_log

[Journal]

Road Trip Day 6

10:00am – Roadside Station Kakegawa

I guess the 8 or 9 hour drive the day before took a tole on me and I slept in until 10:00am in the car. Good thing we stayed over at a big roadside station that had places to sit down. I heard later that my brother got up around 8:00am and started working on his computer at one of the seats inside. I guess he was able to grab breakfast and get in a few hours of work before I even got up.

11:30am – Shin-Shizuoka Cenova

One out of the three places I was set to eat at one our little road trip happened to be Sawayaka, a chain hamburger steak restaurant that only has shops in Shizuoka. What I didn’t know is that most of the stand-alone locations take Thursdays off. We were originally going to get to Shizuoka on Friday, so I didn’t think twice about it, but once we started looking for a Sawayaka nearby, we realized that the only shops that were open today were the ones in shopping malls.

We found a Sawayaka location in the Shin-Shizuoka Cenova building and started our drive over. This location was in a restaurant floor of the shopping mall on the fifth floor. We were surprised to see that there wasn’t a line out the door, but once we entered and gave our name to the hostess, we realized that there were over 30 groups waiting in front of us. (I guess most people go shop around on other floors until their table is ready.) The wait was 70 minutes, but this is what we stopped by Shizuoka for, so we took the QR code and went to look around the mall.

12:00pm – nana’s green tea

We went to the bottom floor of Shin-Shizuoka Cenova to see if we could find a place to sit down while we waited for our table at Sawayaka. We found a nana’s green tea in the food court and decided to get dessert while we waited. I got a soy matcha latte and my brother got the white oolong parfait with a roasted green tea latte.

1:00pm – Sawayaka

We kept checking the QR code to see when our table would be ready. Once the timer hit 15 minutes, the site directed us to head back to the restaurant. Once we got back to the fifth floor, it wasn’t much longer until we were called and taken to our table.

We both got the Genkotsu hamburger steak, with their house-made onion sauce. The waitress gives us paper place mats to cover our clothes while they cut the hamburger steaks in half, press them, and pour the sauce on the sizzling iron plate.

The hamburger steak is served rare (unless otherwise specified,) so the first couple bites are very raw and the meat gets cooked a little more as it sits on the hot iron plate.

We devoured our hamburger steaks in a matter of minutes and headed out happy and full.

2:00pm – Sumpu Castle Park

We saw on Google maps that the Shin-Shizuoka Station was just a block away from Sumpu Castle Park, a big castle park surrounded by a moat. We walked around trying to find a castle, but didn’t see one anywhere. The castle no longer exists…we went to see the Sumpu Castle Tower Ruins instead, which you can take a look at for free. You can also pay an entrance fee to get into the Mommijiyama Garden and East Gate, but we decided that walking around the park was enough for today.

3:00pm – Hug Coffee

Before leaving Shizuoka, we sat down for another cup of coffee at Hug Coffee in the Minamicho area. Hug Coffee was a stylish cafe with their own blends of coffee and array of espresso drinks. I got a cup of their house blend and my brother got a warm latte. We sat there to read and work for an hour in their cozy environment.

Apparently they have a handful of other locations all around Shizuoka and even a vending machine that sells their coffee and original products right outside the shop we were at. With the way the employees were friendly with the regular customers that stopped by seemed very homey, and you could tell that they are keeping that local vibe while providing a stylish environment at the same time.

4:30pm – The final leg

After our coffee break, we started on the last leg of our trip from Shizuoka City to Shin-Kawasaki. The drive ended up being about 4.5 hours with several stops at the convenience stores. We watched the sunset behind us as we left Shizuoka behind and watched as the moon got bigger and brighter as we drove towards it.

We made it to our brother’s place just around 9:00pm. Threw all of our stuff out of the car and into his loft, and was able to go to sleep before midnight for the first time on this trip.

Road trips are always fun, but it can get tiring as well. I’m happy I was able to go to all the stops I planned with my brother and feed him at all my favorite restaurants, but I’m also glad that the hours and hours of driving is over and I can focus my energy on other things.

I plan to use a few weeks to get my body back into shape before I go back to Hawaii, and finally take some time to get this website looking a little better than it is now.