Notes from my travel: Hokkaido

Today was tremulous, to say the least. I came in just before midnight on Sunday and was forced to wake up for the busy day today was.
In my list: overcome some crucial multilingual interface problem for an online qualitative research kicking off Wednesday (still not particularly solved yet as my counterpart is enjoying their Labor Day Monday. OK, don't panic, they may read their e-mails tomorrow...), as well as paying a visit to the immigration office to extend my visa (3 hours wait, but everything was in order) and rehearsed for the guitar orchestra (shameful lesson, my teacher was not impressed I didn't have much practice this past week).

Wanting to put the hecticness behind me, now I am sitting down in my living room with a drink in hand, I put Richard Bona's "Scene of My Life"... I decided to empty my thoughts into a pensive I call a blog. My choice wandered to the wonderful day prior where I roamed free on the roads of Hokkaido.

Sunday morning...
With no particular reason, I was awaken at 5:00 am. My body always spots the differences of beds, and I'm guessing it doesn't like the bed in my room at Hotel Doral.　The hotel itself is not bad, and it's a very good deal for 6,500 yen. I tried to　force myself to sleep a little longer, but all those Sapporo beer we had at Sapporo Bier Garten, pushed me awake. Fine. Might as well get an early start. I did have a very ambitious itinerary.

At 6:30 am my colleague from Australia sent an SMS, "ARE YOU AWAKE AND ABLE TO TAKE ME TO SHIN CHITOSE AIRPORT?"

"YUPE! BEEN UP AND SHOWERED FOR A WHILE NOW. SEE YOU DOWNSTAIRS IN 15 MINUTES."

And so we embarked on our journey to Shin Chitose airport. My colleague had an early flight and it was only 58 km anyway from where we were, I was flexible to change my route.

After dropping A off at the airport, I decided to head towards Shiraoi. According to my travel book, Shiraoi is the nearest Ainu preservation museum from Sapporo area.
Realizing that it was only 7:20 am, I decided to take the regular roads. My reasoning for this: well, I did have the whole day to do this exploring, might as well stop at any place I wish to do, rather than rushing here and there with the expressway.

10 minutes on the road, I was so happy I took the regular roads. The streets of Hokkaido are fantastic! Cars can finally be driven as they're meant to be, very unlike in Honshu!



On my way to "Poroto Kotan", I stopped at a lake where swans were lounging around enjoying the morning sun. Some 20 kms away from it I made another stop at the scenic seaside. I spent about an hour lying there in the sun, enjoying the spray of water from the waves breaking while enjoying the horizon. This is really something you don't see everyday in Honshu.



I finally arrived at the Ainu museum of Poroto Kotan (The Big Village) at 10:00. I was happy I went there. The open air museum displayed the rebuilt Ainu houses, live art (some music and dancing), some improved like village talk by the 'chieftain'. It was all good, but I felt that there were some missing information. So for this part I was not particularly impressed. I am more unimpressed when I saw that at a corner of the village I saw that they have put 4 bears in very small individual cages. I felt that was very cruel.





What I enjoyed the most was when I wandered into the actual museum where they displayed stuff from the ancient Ainu days. There I met an elderly gentleman who's working on a part time basis to help explain about the Ainu culture and tradition. We got into talking when he spotted me struggling to read some of the display explanation which were only available in Japanese. He was a wealth of information regarding the Ainu culture! He was a walking encyclopedia indeed - answered all of my little questions with additional extra explanation. We even went as far as comparing the indigenous people of other regions and tried to dig the root where 'indigenous' cease existing and became a race, and what effect civilization have on humanity, culture et al. Very interesting conversations.

After talking for an hour, I realized I had to go. We found me a book in the museum gift shop, only to realize that he's given me much more information than that was listed in the book!
Thank you, Kind Sir! I wish I had asked him his name to remember him by, especially after he drove me to my car that was parked 1 km away (trying to avoid having to pay the steep parking fee by the entrance - I'm cheap when I'm traveling).

After Poroto Kotan, I decided to see Lake Toya, a lake that was formed from a vanished volcano and it was side by side with a new volcano that suddenly appeared about 30 years ago.
When driving to Poroto Kotan were mostly seaside, going to Lake Toya required me to go drive through the farms, mountains and forests. I was the queen of the roads! The streets were empty, my iPod was blaring loud, I sang at the top of my lungs and then I saw a farm with many, MANY, black cows.
I drove some more and I saw another farm with one cow and 2 goats.
Fab!








Arriving in Lake Toya, I saw the lake with the three mountainettes. Very cool.
And then I drove up to Showa Shinzan (the new volcano). Pretty impressive. The volcano is still fuming with sulfur. Got some pretty interesting shots there.







After all that drive, the day had become late. It was already 3 pm and I had to be back at Shin-Chitose airport by 8 pm so I could go home.
Realizing that I had only 3 more hours to spend in leisurely manner before heading back to the airport, my next choice of destination was Noboribetsu. I needed a bath, I figured... Why not go to a hotspring!
Noboribetsu proved to be a bit of a drive down to the South West coast of Hokkaido. From the high altitude driving down was a bit of a challenge. It was really foggy and raining in some parts. Finally found an onsen that was still open for the late afternoon, got cleaned up and relaxed...



I calculated the drive I've done for the day, by that point: 210 km! Not bad!!
After visiting the hell mountain after the bath, I decided to call my adventure for the day to quits. Yeah, I gotta make my flight at 9 pm. So, I drove back the 77 km from Noboribetsu to Shin Chitose airport.

After the Nippon Rent-A-Car dude dropped me off at the airport - realizing that I haven't had a proper meal the entire day, I decided to give myself a treat. You can always count on Japanese airports: they have good restaurants. My choice fell on Sushi Hanabusa. My farewell meal was sea-urchin bowl and some salmon sushis on the side. The sushi-master who was very friendly and kept me company throughout dinner gave me a gift: a small bowl of prime sea urchin. He would not hear me paying it since it was his farewell gift for a person who loves his Hokkaido sea urchin. Thank you, Sir, from the bottom of my heart!





Now, I am here and back again in Tokyo.

With a toast, I am thinking fondly of the kind people I encountered during my short visit in Hokkaido, the beautiful scenic places, the Ainus, the brilliant food, the free spirit drive, the cows, the milk, the cool weather. I dig Hokkaido!

I will be back!