24 May 2024 Hotel Classe, Chitose
Our entry into Japan on this, our 10th trip, has been just as we expected, smooth and trouble free. Formalities at Narita on arrival were fast and efficient. We left the plane, got through Immigration and Customs, picked up the shuttle bus to the Tobu Narita Hotel and were checked in within 30 minutes.
After a good night's sleep and a great buffet breakfast, we were back at the airport to activate our JR Rail Passes and pick up our pocket wifi before our flight to Hokkaido. As luck would have it, our particular flight had been selected to celebrate Jetstar Japan's 50 millionth journey. In true Japanese tradition, there were uniformed staff waving flags, large balloons and, of course, the mandatory company mascot, a cute little bear-like creature. The press was there in droves and we may well have become unwitting Japanese TV stars.
This afternoon, we shopped for the “roadie” which will take us around Hokkaido for the next week. While our shop was only for one night, we were happily surprised by how cheap everything was. Our first experience of driving in Japan was equally pleasant, with little traffic and very courteous drivers. Compared to our recent experiences driving in Greece, this was heaven!
We don't usually do hotel reviews as part of our blogs, but tonight's accommodation in Chitose are so good we just have to comment. Free parking, large room, in-room washing machine and cooking facilities were amazing, even though there were no pans, plates or cutlery to allow for cooking. Most impressive was the most helpful young woman on reception, with whom we chatted. She had spent four years in Australia including two in Brisbane and we happily shared stories.
25 May, Furano, Hokkaido
Bad start to the day today, but our fortunes eventually turned around.
The key fob for our little Japanese Noddy car didn’t work last night, but we weren’t too concerned as we could open the door with the physical key. BUT, this morning, only the driver's door would open, even with the key. Then we tried to start the car. No go. With the help of the wonderful receptionist at our hotel, we managed to get a road assistance crew out who jump-started the car and tried to assure us that there was no problem. Not keen on having another breakdown in the wilds of Hokkaido, we returned to the hire location and swapped the car.
The up side was that our first full day of driving in Hokkaido was a breeze! The pace is a little slow, most of the time the speed limits were 50 kph and even on the Expressway the limit was mostly 80kph. No bother for us, we had all day to travel 140 km from Chitose to Furano.
On a whim, we left the Expressway, heading for Yubari, a town we picked at random from the map. After an interesting 30 minute drive through some beautiful forested hills, we came to what can only be described as a “dump of a town.” We drove on, looking for a spot to turn around and noticed a sign for the Coal Mining Museum of Yubari. We drove in through some fairly desolate, closed-up industrial buildings, parked and headed off on foot. Eventually we arrived at a modern complex, paid our minimal entry fee and wandered about looking at the displays which were almost totally in Japanese. Piecing together the photos and what we could translate with our translator app, we worked out that Yubari had once been a major coal producing town. However, like similar towns in the UK, as the coal was depleted, the town slowly died. From a population of 160,000 in its heyday, Yubari had shrunk to 7,500 people by 2012. There were no figures, but there isn't much left of the town today.
The museum, however, was magnificent. From the two floors of static displays and video presentations, a lift took us down to a reconstruction of the working mine, taking us through the mining techniques from the early days of mining in the late 18th century to a live display of original equipment used in the 1980s and 1990s.
Before heading back to the Expressway and resuming our journey, we turned off and visited what once was the vibrant main street of old Yubari. A true Japanese ghost town.
26 May, Kuretake Inn, Asahikawa
Furano isn't a very big city, even by Australian standards. In comparison to cities on Honshu, it is more like a big village, so we weren't too surprised that our eating options last night, Saturday, were very limited. However we had scouted the town late in the afternoon and found a couple of options that looked promising. We were a little concerned though, as our hotel's restaurant guide showed many establishments as having “irregular" closing times. It all turned out well and after struggling with the electronic, all Japanese, ordering system, we gave up and called for a waiter. The meal was fine, not spectacular, but the atmosphere was very traditional and the bill had us rushing out the door, because we felt we had robbed them. AUD$35 for two enormous beers, a large salad and meat skewers. The last was disappointing, but what the...
Walking back to our hotel, which was only about 750m, we didn't see a car or another person.
An easy driving day today. As the crow flies, and there are crows in Hokkaido, it was about 100k between our hotels, but we had some attractions to cover in between. This area of Hokkaido is famous for its fields of flowers. Sadly, we are a little early to enjoy the full effect of the fields in full bloom, but we got the general idea at our first stop, Farm Tomita, a touristy flower growing enterprise, also famous for its lavender ice cream.
We spent the morning and early afternoon cruising the area through rolling hills which were being planted in the early weeks of Hokkaido's short summer growing season.
By chance, we found our way to the “famous" Ken and Mary poplar trees. We had no idea what these trees were all about, in fact, we pulled up simply because there was a car park and a small number of people gathered around the trees. A sign at the site informed us that the trees had featured in a 1972 commercial. At first we shrugged and headed back to our car, but, this is Japan and we have seen crazier things than this, so we went back and took a picture. This is a true “only in Japan" thing. Later we found a video online of the advertisement. It was for a Nissan Skyline car. The trees were in shot for less than 10 seconds!
Next, Blue Pond. Obviously, well known in Japan, there were tourist buses and scores of locals about. Blue it certainly was, but not a natural phenomena. The colour was caused by chemical contamination when a nearby dam was constructed.
We have to note that in our travels today, we saw only one Westerner. There were plenty of local Japanese and possibly some Chinese, but numbers of visitors at every place we went to were tiny. We’re enjoying being off the tourist track.
Arriving in Asahikawa a couple of hours before check-in to our hotel, we visited the Asahikawa City Museum. Yet another surprise. A well-presented walk through the history of Hokkaido, almost totally in Japanese, but we understood most of it.
