10 November 2024
Fukuoka was the last destination of our 8 days road trip around Kyushu. We would be staying only one night before flying home next morning.
The city is loosely divided into two halves, Hakata and Tenjin, with the island of Nakasu in the middle. We chose to stay near the Hakata Station since it is the most convenient location to get to the airport and it is also one of Fukuoka's central districts.
We drove into Fukuoka at slightly past 2 PM. We returned our rental car at the Toyota Rentacar shop next to the Hakata Station. Our hotel in Fukuoka is the Hotel Nikko Fukuoka, conveniently located within 5 minutes walk from the car rental shop and Hakata Station.
We spent the rest of the afternoon and evening at Canal City Hakata, about 15 minutes walk from our hotel.
Canal City Hakata is a large shopping and entertainment complex, calling itself a "city within the city". Attractions include about 250 shops, cafes and restaurants, a theater, cinemas and a canal running through the complex.
The artificial canal runs right through the middle of the five floored entertainment complex, creating a lot of open space. At the center of the canal there is a fountain with water shows every 30 minutes from 10:00 until 22:00.
The shops are open till about 9 PM 21:00 so we had time for some shopping and also dinner.
The stores that caught our attention are the stores dedicated to Japanese popular culture, and especially official stores for Jump (One Piece, Naruto, Dragon Ball…), Studio Ghibli, Ultraman shop, Sanrio’s Hello Kitty etc.
Especially interesting are the Gundam Base at Level 1 and the Namco Bandai store at B1 where there are lots of machine games and people playing the One Piece card game.
In terms of the food, there were also a wide variety of restaurants, offering Japanese and international food. We went to the "Ramen Stadium", located on the fifth floor. There are eight ramen shops with noodle dishes from across Japan, including the local specialty Hakata Ramen. For some unknown reason, we did not feel like eating ramen on this day and at this place. Instead we went back down to B1 to eat Japanese burgers at the Masajiro Burger. The burgers were surprising good and very reasonably priced too.
Also located at B1 is a store selling strawberry based sweets. Fukouka Prefecture is known for its "Amaou" strawberries, known for their large size and perfect balance of sweetness and acidity.
We tried the Amaou strawberry smoothie which was very refreshing and delicious. It was also interesting to see the staff making the dorayaki through the glass window. This popular dorayaki snack encases a delectable Amaou strawberry mousse within a soft, chewy exterior and cost 594 yen each!
We ended our shopping in Canal City with bags of Japanese sweets from a shop at the basement to bring home. These includes the Hakata Torimon, Menbei crackers and the cute, chick-shaped Hiyoko sweet.
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