Cheaper than a cup of coffee!! Fist-sized grilled live scallops at Aomori’s Yasukata Center

Text & Photos /Guo Renrong

No kidding!!! We’re talking about freshly grilled live scallops in Aomori, Japan—way cheaper than your Starbucks coffee!! Today, our fun travel host is taking you to Yasukata Center in Aomori to enjoy the freshest seafood!!! First, check out this sneak peek video:

How to get to Yasukata Center?! Actually, there’s a 100-yen shuttle bus that runs daily between JR Hachinohe Station and the center, so if you use the JR EAST PASS to take the shinkansen from Tokyo to Hachinohe Station, just transfer to the 100-yen bus and you’re there!!

Yasukata Center is actually a well-organized, clean fish market without that overwhelming fishy smell.

Here you’ll find a dazzling array of seafood, all sold at wholesale port prices. My personal favorite is the huge live scallops straight from Mutsu Bay.

What the?! A whole plate of black tiger prawns for just 1,000 yen!! That’s super cheap!!

Oysters that are safe to eat raw are just 200 yen each!!! What a bargain!!

Here’s what our trio scored that day

And let us tell you about a great spot inside Yasukata Center—a charcoal grill restaurant that will cook your seafood fresh for you. They provide the charcoal and equipment, and all we have to pay is 300 yen per adult to use the Nanatsunokami Village equipment for free.

My buddy Hong and I are ready to dig in Up!!

And here’s a business card from the shop~

After our meal, Mr. Hong drove us to a truly amazing place. Although he said he was taking us to pray at a shrine, turns out~~~ there are thousands of “sea cats” here. Our fun travel host was suddenly surrounded by sea cats~~ kinda scary~~ I really wanted to scream for help~~~ Don’t believe me? Check out the video:

If you have trypophobia, you might not even make it up the hill to the shrine, because once you reach the top and look toward the sea, you’ll see this densely packed sight.

The entire shrine is taken over by “sea cats”

There are definitely fewer people than sea cats here, so we’re the underdogs~~ sob. Why do locals call them sea cats instead of seagulls? Because the cries of these sea cats really sound like a cat in heat, hence the name UMINEKO (sea cat).

Legend says that walking around the shrine on the hill three times brings good fortune, but the path is really tough—you have to dodge low-flying sea cat surprise attacks, watch out for bird poop falling from above, and worst of all, if the sea cats are in a bad mood, they might screech at you and block your way. But our fun travel host isn’t one to back down—I’m fighting back against the sea cats!!! Ha~~~

After circling the shrine three times and praying, you can buy a lucky omamori charm from the nearby vendor—remember to keep it in your purse.

Just a short walk from the shrine, there’s also an observation deck with views of Tanesashi Coast.

Springtime at Tanesashi Coast is lovely, with vast green grassy fields and the warm sunlight shining down—you might just fall asleep lying there without realizing it!!

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