honshu in aomori in front of a big factory  that sells lots of cider and we're about  

to go on a whirlwind road trip across aomori  prefecture it's going to be a lot of fun these  

are apples they look like grapes but  they're not they're apples and don't take  

them don't pick them off in public that would  be wrong that'd be very bad but don't do that

aomori lies at the most northern tip of honshu  it's a region with a strong cultural identity  

and an impressive range of cuisine from japan's  most prized tuna in the sugary straight in the  

north to horse meat bbq in the historic town of  gonaha in the east today however we're going on  

a journey of west armory to try five local dishes  including an incredibly rare delicacy bear meat  

something i can't say i've ever had  before but why is it eaten here and what  

does it taste like we'll also stay overnight  at a traditional inn visit a picturesque shrine  

and watch ryotaro make a fool of himself as  per usual and our two-day road trip kicks off  

in aomori city at the a factory a tribute to the  region's number one export apples and of course  

the presence of apples means you can enjoy  the perfect drink to kick off your morning  

there's a reason i love aomori so much it's not  just the apples it's the cider and this is a side  

of vending machine for 200 yen you can get a shot  of your favorite brand and my favorite is kimori  

cider sweet i'm having this instead of coffee  this morning come on fill that cup no what is  

that it it's like a shot of cider probably a good  thing given it's only nine o'clock in the morning  

obviously you can't drink and drive in japan  and we are going on a road trip so i needed a  

driver a chauffeur and they're all busy so i've  got ryotaro with us how you doing realtor and  

expensive strobe expensive chauffeur oh this is  good nice crisp refreshing taste of apple in the  

morning beautiful beautiful as a liquor breakfast  that's what we have liquor breakfast i know you  

and i don't agree on any things we have today but  one thing we do agree on is aomori is our favorite  

prefecture in tohoku there's six prefectures  in tohoku and we live in miyagi prefecture  

uh what is it about aomori that keeps bringing us  back anyway i don't know they've got lots of meat  

good meat and also uh you got cider there and all  great uh fish as well the sushi that they serve  

really good sushi here as well but let's face  it it's mainly decided at least for me anyway  

in my defense i need a lick of breakfast just to  get through my morning with ryotaro but our first  

stop an hour west of aomori city is one of japan's  longest wooden bridges the dancing crane bridge  

constructed from local cypress trees and famous  for its three iconic arches walking across it is  

said to bring good luck as the crane is seen as a  symbol of longevity in japanese culture it seems  

rather fitting given that aomori has the lowest  life expectancy in any prefecture in japan and  

we'll find out why a bit later on and no it's not  because of the beds so we just stopped off at the  

longest triple arch bridge in japan is that right  three 300 meters long it could just be the longest  

bridge they had to complicate with arches but the  thing is they could not call it the longest bridge  

there's a longest triple ice bridge that's what  it is it's all about getting that tighter isn't  

it exactly it's number one tyson that they needed  it's a really nice view though we've got mount  

iwaki in the background the tallest mountain in  aomori right yep so how long's this bridge been  

300 years 400 years 23 years what 23. 23 years  do they build these bridges just to win awards  

and get those triple arch titles i guess so  it's nice though like if you are going to build  

a bridge across a lake don't just build another  boring generic bridge build something like this  

right build something that's actually beautiful  to look at so i think you're going to be you're  

going to be building what they do cuatro what is  it like quattro bridge quattro uh irish bridge  

number one quattro arch bridge that's what it is  let's get crowdfunding let's go make it happen

checking into our traditional win at duckie  hot springs before enjoying our evening banquet  

serving up three local meat dishes i'm able to  finally sneak away from ryotaro to the comfort  

of my own room so just checked into the room  and it's my favorite part of any journey with  

ryotaro the bit where i get to go to my own room  and get away from the man for a few minutes and  

the room today is rather spectacular check  this out how beautiful is this now i'll admit  

when i come out and film these videos these  days i often don't bother filming the room  

anymore because i've seen it so many times  that they all start to blend into one they  

all start to look the same but this one in  particular has so much character to it the  

artwork the pottery the embroidery the lighting  the lighting it's pretty elaborate here there's  

even some sort of stove in the middle of the table  that i don't know how to use and i didn't use it  

for fear of burning the place down but still  my time in this room is fairly short-lived  

we're about to go and get dinner and i  know it's going to be a weird one ryotaro  

mentioned that it involves a lot of bizarre  meats and well that's never a good thing

usually

what do we got then riyadh this there's  a there's an assortment of meats here  

i don't know what they are hunter uma

okay so what's uh what's this one here i'm  gonna call this the most daring looking dish  

uh what is it looks like sashimi oh is it deer  sashimi deer deer but like a day they lightly  

cooked um on a surface have you ever had it before  yes is it good super good super good you should  

try it super good just to try what about this  one here this one there okay this looks like  

a cake yeah this looks like beef i'm going to say  this is some sort of local beef uh look or beer  

what local bear local beer local bear you  can eat bear in japan they are hunters  

a japanese hunter is called matagi and  they are the ones that who actually hunt  

there but not like you know just shooting around  or anything recently there are too many bears that  

sometimes hurt people and some people actually  killed by bear too so they're like group of  

hunters who who hunt the bear um are only limited  to a certain amount of numbers i've heard bear  

attacks are actually up recently because uh as  the population goes down in the countryside the  

bears have been getting a little bit more bold  actually wandering into this sort of run-down  

villages yeah yeah so we've got deer we've got  bear what is this one here mushrooms and pork  

white ball wild ball same thing well you can't go  wrong with wild ball that's usually pretty good  

okay one dish out of three that i know is  good for sure let's uh let's see if they live  

up to the height let's start with the deer oh you  haven't had any deer so you should start with the  

chimney you should you should dip into the sauce  here and put some garlic on all right here we go

it actually tastes a lot like sashimi no if  you close your eyes i mean if you keep your  

eyes open it still looks like sashimi it tastes  like sashimi that's pretty good where the deer  

that this come from oh just a mountain back in  the backyard i think i'm not really sure you've  

got a weird dinner dear bear balls sounds like  a wrap what kind of wrap is that they're bad boy

why is he there why is he here one to ten on the  day dear ten good i love i love the deer sashimi  

i'll give it nine so we've lit the grill  yep for the uh the bear the bear in the  

meantime let's have some wild ball yeah there's  something quite surreal when i first moved here  

i remember i went walking just on my own in  the mountains i was enjoying it and then i  

walked past a bear sign it dawned on me that  bears exist in japan and i turned around and  

ran back to my car very quickly while the  number of attacks are going up they're still  

pretty uncommon to stop coming and also like  if your bears normally right they they fear  

the human being so all right here we go then do  you just have it do you have it with any sauce no  

it's salted in a pepper smells a bit  like uh beef what smells like beef yeah  

how's that like it's pretty chewy but it's got  a really satisfying meaty kind of flavor to it  

it does and it's absolutely covered  in salt and pepper with the garlic  

it's a really nice combination of flavors would  i eat it often no i think it's a very special  

meat i'm going to give the deer nine out of ten  the pork the wild boar rebel ar tim and the bear  

and eight out of ten eight eight nine  so dear actually one day one yeah i mean  

people might find it a little bit um you know  uncomfortable yeah eating bambi raw it sounds good  

that'll be the title of this video yeah so  eating bambi raw you'll be sued by disney you  

know what i mean but what is it about elmore  why do they hunt bears here of all places  

well first of all uh they're more moon bears and  they saw heart like hurting people as well that's  

one thing and also these hunters have always  been hunting over like 100 years or more 200  

years almost these hunters obviously they we eat  right instead of like wasting the meat right we  

actually eat the meat too it's like there's  often stories in the media you read where a  

bear walks onto somebody's farm turns up and has  a fight with somebody like i read a story about an  

elderly man in aomori that punched a bear in the  face that was attacking his orchard i was stealing  

some apples or do you think you could fight a  bear i'll fight with bumby thank you that way  

now that i would pay to sleep bambi versus ryotaro

last night um i heard like really heavy rain and  this morning i woke up and like i saw snow and i  

went and got out and this is what i see the snow  in front of me all over it's the first the first  

time i saw snow this year and this is our murray  this is it on a clear day iwakiyama ginger which  

sits at the base of maunawaki has a clear view of  the mountain but the snowfall has got in the way  

nevertheless as we soak up the tranquil  surroundings and the locals quietly sweep  

away the falling leaves ryotaro does his  best to take advantage of the peaceful shrine  

time to do my morning prayer

if you ever want to do a prayer at a shrine  of japan the pattern to follow is bow twice

clap twice say your prayer

and finish with a final bow just make sure to  pray for something good what did you pray for  

conquering the world conquering the world at 9  30 in the morning yeah exactly what horrible man

he doesn't even have a rebuttal  just after in it that's it

aomori the home of apple look my  kingdom apple kingdom [ __ ] terrifying

every year over 700 000 tons of apples are  produced in japan and aomori prefecture  

accounts for over 50 per cent even within  aomori there are places more famous than  

others for their highly prized apples such  as these orchards here on the outskirts of  

hirosaki city we've stopped off to meet  a friend of ryotaro's nami hal dempoia  

a native of the distant landlocked  prefecture of nagano she moved 600  

kilometers north to be closer to the sea and  in the years since she's become a farmer and  

a massive orchard in the shadow of mount iwaki  and there's only one question on ryotaro's mind

it's famous for apples i don't think  we've said it in this video yet but  

uh we've had apple juice we've had cider we've  had bears and i'm sure the bears eat apples and  

the last thing on our list is apple pie it'd  be a crime to come all this way to aomori  

and not have one for our last stop of the  journey we head into the city of hirosaki  

where ryotaro plans to stuff me with two more  must try local apple dishes and also reveal  

why aomori prefecture has the shortest life  expectancy of any prefecture in all of japan

so after the wild animal course we're gonna  apple pie apple course apple pie cookies  

you say apple pie i've got apple curry here with  slices of apple inside it looks fantastic it's  

where's that already i'm gonna start ready you  can have the pies i have the curry one thing that  

interested me though is what you told me earlier  is that people in aomori have the shortest life  

expectancy in all of japan right i think nagano  prefecture the life expectancy is 84 they're  

number one and aomori is 82. so the whole two  years short why is that any ideas why it's being  

said that the aomori people like loves their salty  things and a sweet thing so like lots of sugar  

lots of salt lots of apples and lots of beds and  also the the biggest consumption of instant ramen  

in whole japan i'll do it that'll do it right  and i also did doing a lot of um sake because  

the sake is a really good hit so it's like  all the good things to make them live short  

that's what i can tell and your friend has  a tour in our morning called the unhealthy  

tour or something and it's like uh life is  short tour life is short that's what it is  

that's an amazing idea for a tour not history not  culture just the quickest way to die on a tour  

and there is a rule that you you go to rubbish  up right and it's tall and you have to drink up  

the whole soup of ramen oh my god because that's a  lot of salt that's a death sentence doing that but  

what at all that'd probably do quite well no it  did well it did really well did oh it did do well  

this curry is really good uh the apples i don't  eat it no it's horrible it's disgusting you don't  

want it no you don't want it the kind of sweetness  and the beef and the curry is really nice it goes  

well i think per capita hirosaki the city we're  in now has more coffee shops than most places  

in japan because each coffee shop has their own  variant on an apple pie and the idea is to get  

people into their different coffee shops they  even have a map i've got a map that describes oh  

which coffee shop has got what kind of apple pie  this is any awkward sludgy hell and it's all good  

like an apple pie map if you haven't been sold  on aomori so far this this should seal the deal  

yeah everybody help and they'll tell you where  they are so i look how many they are that's what  

this video should have been should have been you  and i going to every apple pie shop in hirosaki  

and then apple and then dying and dieting  lowering the life expectancy even more  

exactly to be honest after all the things we've  eaten on our trip i expect my life expectancy is  

probably dipped as well uh all the dishes we've  seen on this trip though which one did you think  

you want to try the most the wild boar the bears  the deer the apples the pie the curry what would  

you like to try let us know in the comments below  but for now guys as always me thanks for joining  

us on our journey across el mory today we'll  see you right back here on this tour japan  

channel don't waver again next time no no your  life expectancy is about to get a lot shorter