Emiiichan Blog ☆ : Tohoku 5-day JR East Rail Pass trip Day 1

This is the beginning of our 5-day trip using the JR East Rail Pass to bounce all around Tohoku at the end of May 2023. My husband and I planned to spend this trip and were happy to have my parents (flying in from HI) and my brother and his wife (flying in from CA) join us for this journey after they arrived 1 day prior and spent it in Tokyo.

If you're interested in an overview of the JR East Rail Pass, budgeting notes or more general information, consider checking out my first post here!

Day 1 overview:

06:30 - 09:30 Tokyo station to Hachinohe station (Hayabusa shinkansen)

9:45 - 9:58 Bus (Hasshoku 100yen line) to Hasshoku Center - 100yen

10:00 Hasshoku Center / Hachinohe Fish Market including brunch with charcoal grill

12:29 - 12:45 train Nagawashiro to Same station

13:15 Kabu Island/Kabushima shrine

14:24 - 14:45 train Same station to Hachinohe station

15:05 - 15:29 Hachinohe to Shin-Aomori station (Hayabusa shinkansen)

15:41 - 15:47 train Shin-Aomori to Aomori station

16:00 Check into Toyoko Inn Aomori Ekimae

Activities and dinner in Aomori city area

Nebuta Museum WA RASSE (09:00 - 18:00)

A-FACTORY (10:00 - 19:00)

Aomori Prefecture Tourism Information ASPAM (09:30 - 18:00)

Pre-Day 1 logistics

My husband and I had prepped by picking up our JR East Rail Passes and getting seat reservations through the JR EAST website for all shinkansens we were planning to catch in addition to one limited express train, 12 reservations each. We picked up the reserved seat tickets we reserved at the Shinagawa station Midori no Madoguchi office before continuing on to Tokyo station on Day 0.

I had recorded our seat selections on a spreadsheet for the rest of my family to follow and get their own seat reservations. Since they were utilizing the Japan-wide 7-day JR Rail Passes (not an option for us as non-tourists) and had purchased with vouchers, they could only get their reserved seats once receiving the actual pass upon their arrival. They made their seat reservations using the Reserved Ticket kiosks at Tokyo station.

For Day 0, my husband and I met up with my parents, brother and SIL at Hotel Ryumeikan Tokyo, where they had already been staying upon their arrival the day prior.

We chose to stay at a hotel closer to Tokyo station so we wouldn't have to deal with the logistics and super early morning of trying to get to the station with all of our stuff from our home in Kanagawa on the morning of Day 1.

Day 1 start!

We packed up and checked out just before 06:00am on Friday, May 26, ready to start our trip. Anticipating all of the moving around we'd be doing, we each had a small duffle/large tote and a personal bag (purse/pouch or backpack) for all of our belongings for the next 5 days.

It was a short walk to Tokyo station from the hotel, and we easily made our way over to the Tohoku Shinkansen tracks. We were about 25 minutes early for our train, so we sat in the waiting room for a little bit before heading to the platform where the train was already waiting.

The first Hayabusa of the day is often pretty popular and all seats require a reservation. Since we waited to reserve our tickets until closer to when my family arrived, so we were all sitting a little separate but at least in the same car for the 3 hour journey headed north - Hachinohe bound!

We were all excited to get started and be somewhere near when we reached our first destination - Hachinohe station.

First things first - get rid of our large bags at the train station lockers. The tourist information center pointed me in the right direction to find it under the escalators and there were a lot available when we were there at about 09:30. For the 6 of us, we put easily fit our things into 1-600yen locker and 1-500yen locker. We used our SUICA as a payment method and it was electronically locked (no key) which made things really easy.

Just outside JR Hachinohe station you can find the bus transit area. At No 4, the Hasshoku 100yen bus was already waiting. This isn't covered by the JR East Rail Pass, but we were able to use SUICA to pay for the 100yen fare. The bus timetable is aligned comfortably with the shinkansen arrival, so we had no issues finding it and getting seats before it left at 09:45.

Very easy access to Hasshoku Center, 7 stops away from where we got on at Hachinohe Station and the terminal stop, so it's hard to get it wrong.

We got to Hasshoku Center just before 10:00 and intended to make use of Shichirin-mura for a late breakfast/early lunch. For 400yen per person, you can use a charcoal grill and have everything you need to prepare a meal (tongs, napkins, chopsticks, shoyu, disposable plates) using ingredients you can buy in the market! Time limit is 2 hours.

We were shown our assigned table and grill and then provided a basket for "shopping"! Of course there is a plethora of different seafood choices (fish and shellfish, etc) but also some stalls have meats or yakitori-type items as well - be sure to look around even in the far corner. You can let the vendors know you're eating at Shichirin-mura and they will package the items appropriately for that.

We returned to the grill and just started cooking/eating! If it's your preference, you can eat the items raw as well. Shichirin-mura has free water for drinking, but also other drinks like beer for sale as well as some common sides like rice, etc.

Two hours was plenty of time for us and we even went back out and came back a few times once we figured out what would be best to eat. When you're done, clean up your area (trash thrown away and any Shichirin-items returned to the reception), and that's it! The salmon belly, sliced beef, grilled butter onigiri and strawberries (not grilled lol) were a huge hit for us.

We still had some time, so we looked around the market to shop and try other items. Since this was just the beginning of travel, we didn't want to buy much omiyage yet, but this market is a great place to do that if you're not limited on space!

My husband and his genmai (brown rice) soft serve

Upon leaving Hasshoku Center, this is when things started to go a little awry lol. The walking route to the nearest train station (Nagawashiro station) was about 18 minutes according to Google Maps. Unfortunately, the route it wanted us to walk through was under construction and we had to go a longer way that impacted our arrival time.

In the end, we all literally ran for about 2-3 minutes through the streets to get to the station where we were very appreciative that the conductor waited for us since the next train wouldn't be there for about 50 minutes and there's nothing else to do in the area lol.

This was our first experience with the local trains in the area which are a lot smaller than I'm used to seeing - sometimes just two cars and the stations might even have manual tickets (no SUICA) to be checked/collected by the conductor or a station attendant. But the insides were nice and new! We were grateful to make it Same station after about a 25 minute ride.

This was another 15 minute walk, but there wasn't a time restriction and we took our time walking through the neighborhood to find Kabushima!

It's quite a site to see in person with all of the seagulls and how the torii gates and the building standout on the hill.

The number of seagulls, the smell and the noise they made are difficult to describe lol. There is a shared umbrella stand near the bottom of the stairs, and we all did not hesitate to each borrow one to protect us from any potential bird poop from above.

During the season we visited, there were a lot of brown baby seagulls and some with nests as well!

Honestly, I don't even know what else to say about this lol. It was a genuine experience because of the mix between the local wildlife, the noise and the Japanese shrine AND nearly missing our train to get there lol. It definitely was unique!

We easily made our way back to Same station with plenty of time before the next train. We made sure we didn't cut it too close and ended up waiting about 20 minutes inside the station, but at least no running this time lol.

There is a bus that will take you to and from the station area to Kabushima, but since the weather was nice, and we had time to spare, we opted to walk both ways.

We hopped back on the local train, but all the way back to Hachinohe station this time.

Picked up our large bags from the lockers.

And onto the platform for our next shinkansen!

Another Hayabusa since we're continuing our way north. This time it's just a short ride to Shin-Aomori station, but since it's included in the Rail Pass, we definitely wanted to take the opportunity to catch the fastest train whenever possible.

We made a quick transfer at Shin-Aomori to get to Aomori station (local train, 6 min ride) and walked directly to our hotel for the night - Toyoko Inn Aomori Ekimae, so we could drop off our bags and continue exploring.

Right next to the hotel is Nebuta Museum WA RASSE. Aomori is known for their summer festival called the Aomori Nebuta Matsuri which happens annually in August. Since we wouldn't be in the area for the actual festival, visiting the museum is the next best thing!

You're able to see the history of the floats, learn about their construction and see examples up close. There's also a informative video (with English subtitles) that plays about every 30 minutes to introduce the history and the specific floats on display.

It's a really spacious and interesting museum that cultivates an appreciation for the artistry that contributes to the creation and execution of these floats! Being able to see them up closer and from all different angles is really insightful.

Next, despite the rain, we continued on to Aomori Prefecture Tourism Information ASPAM. It's a triangle shaped building with an observatory deck at the top. Since we had arrived on the later side of the day, it didn't seem very lively. We opted not to pay for entry to the observation deck since it was bleary, cloudy and grey at the time, but still stopped to check out some of the other exhibits.

We got to learn about the Aomori mascot Ikube who is supposedly a fairy lol.

And there were a handful of shops with a variety of souvenirs representative of the area.

Walking back towards the hotel, we first made a stop at A-FACTORY (and this large AOMORI sign on the sand on the side of it lol).

We were expecting to find a dinner option here, but were pretty disappointed. Even though it was just after 18:00, many of the restaurants were already closed or close to doing last order. The selection of omiyage was also not quite what the websites that were promoting this location seemed to promise - at least to us. Supposedly if cider is your thing, this may be a more worthwhile stop for you though!

Needing an alternate dinner option, we started walking towards a ramen shop I had bookmarked when we happened upon 大福丸 Daifuku Maru which had a boat with a bunch of scallop shells outside that intrigued my family, and we made an impulse decision to eat here instead.

Ordering was done on a tablet and they had an English menu we could reference as well.

Some typical dishes you might find at an Izakaya with a few specialty items as well. This restaurant suited us well because we were able to order family style and have a variety of dishes to choose from and the tablet made it easy to order again if we liked anything in particular. There was even a live shamisen performance while we were there!

It was just a short walk back to our hotel to end the night.

Day 1 passed quickly, but we accomplished all that was on our itinerary by making our way into Tohoku with a brief stop in Hachinohe before spending the night in Aomori.

Recommendations:

‣ grilling at Hassoku Center (Shichirin) - fun experience, not too expensive, especially for fresh seafood, but also has meat options!

‣ Kabushima Shrine - such an interesting place, unless you dislike birds or loud animals

‣ Nebuta Museum WA RASSE - definitely a must-do if in Aomori (unless you're there for the actual festival) because the floats are incredible

Personally, I would pass on: A-FACTORY and would only go to Aomori Prefecture Tourism Information ASPAM if the weather is good for the observatory or you want a hub for omiyage. However, if you're just looking to kill time or go earlier during the day, maybe either of these are better worth it.

Another change I'd consider making to our itinerary is making time to catch a bus BACK to Hachinohe station from Hasshoku Center and then catching a local train from Hachinohe to Same station to get to Kabushima Shrine (rather than a long-walk-turned-run to Nagawashiro Station). Running to catch the train ended up being an core memory of the trip that we reference a lot, but it's really not preferable.

We were constantly on the go this day, and not stopping here for long!

Let me know if you've been to these areas. What did we miss?