Hokka 14
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PEDAL JUNE 2009
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Gem of the North Pacific Of Japan’s four main islands, Hokkaido is the second-largest and northernmost. The distinctly shaped island is known for being more sparsely populated than the others and for being a showcase of natural beauty. With icy winters and a continental-type climate devoid of muggy summers and rainy season, our end-of-May arrival from Honshu wasn’t coincidental. At the ferry terminal for the Tsugaru Strait crossing to Hakodate, a young Japanese man was eating a snack beside a loaded bike. He had the now-ubiquitous list of “very famous” sights to see and was very excited to be heading into Japan’s frontier zone, a gem of a touring destination. And so were we!
lthough Hokkaido has a history, climate and geography of its own, it is still Japan. Proof of that came on our first night on the island. Our tent was set up in a baseball park’s outfield until 4:30 a.m., when markers, players and referees showed up in spotless uniforms and played a full game before breakfast and a long day at the office! It was time to head down to Hakodate’s “famous” market anyway to indulge in fresh sashimi donburi laden with raw scallops, crab and sea urchin, an energizing, protein-rich breakfast before heading around Kameda Peninsula. As E-San and Komaga-take volcanoes were hidden in clouds, we settled instead for leisurely bathing in the natural hot springs found at the base of each smoking mountain. When Highway #5 departed from the coast and headed inland toward Niseko, we lost our bearings. Japan had thus far been about sea coasts littered with fishing boats and anti-erosion concrete blocks, or about deeply embanked rivers and sharp sinuous valleys. We were now rolling over a carpet of wheat and cornfields. This patchwork, along with the cows and the heavy agricultural machinery animating it, made us think that we had returned to our native North America. But no, it was still Japan, and the road was strewn with its ubiquitous Michi-no-Eki, a series of rest areas offering vending machines, heated bathrooms, Internet connection, road information, local produce, noodle shops and, sometimes, hot springs! With approximately 100 of them on Hokkaido alone, Michi-no-Eki’s ample parking lots and manicured surroundings became our home on most nights spent on the island! Having witnessed planeloads of Japanese skiers landing in Vancouver every winter in search of some Whistler powder, I assumed the country had no great skiing. As it turns out, Hokkaido is one of Japan’s best-kept secrets, with multiple resorts boasting world-class terrain, the driest and lightest powder, cheap lift tickets and uncrowded runs. Not into groomed runs? No worries, Hokkaido is a backcountry heaven! Cycling
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SUMMER 2009 PEDAL
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Hakkaido is a back country
haven by the Niseko group, we imagined a day gliding down on its snowy slopes followed by a rotemburo (outdoor hot springs) dip under a starry winter sky and a sake-splashed après-ski meal. We promptly put a winter visit to Hokkaido on our “things-to-do-before-we-die” list. Back on the bikes after a hike to the summit of Yotei-san’s sharp 2,000-metre-high cone, Niseko group’s venerable neighbour, Pierre discovered that he would need a replacement rear rim before long. His Vbrakes, over time, had split the sidewalls, making it impossible for him to use his rear brakes anymore! In the heart of Japan’s “Milkland,” amidst cow pastures, forested hills and lofty volcanoes, bike shops were few and far between. Then came Dennis, a highly sympathetic and atypical Dutch expatriate whom we met by chance at Kyogoku mineral water springs resort — one of Japan’s “100 best water,” according to “the list” for everything that concerns the Land of the Rising Sun! Dennis confirmed what we thought already — we would need to wait until we got to Sapporo. A resident of Hokkaido’s metropolis himself, Dennis invited us to pay him a visit in the near future. He had come to Japan on a bike eight years prior to our meeting and had since acquired “alien” status. When we said good-bye, we were already looking forward to getting to know this flamboyant white Rasta better. But first we had some volcanic caldera lakes to cycle to and survey. Lake Toya is 42 kilometres around; has a central island (a bulging dome); a fuming stratovolcano on its southern rim, Mount Usu; and was the site of 2008 G8 Summit — this ain’t no common place! Then, after having hauled ourselves up to Lake Kuttara, above Noboribetsu, the “most famous” onsen resort town on Hokkaido, we headed for a spin around Lake Shikotsu. After 20 kilometres on the south rim, just where Road #78 was going to take us behind Mount Eniwa — one of three active volca16
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PEDAL SUMMER 2009
noes found on Shikotsu-ko’s rim and site of Sapporo’s 1972 Winter Olympics downhill course — there was a barricade with a big red “X” painted on it! According to two salmon fishermen who discovered our lakeside campsite, a rare typhoon had destroyed the small road some four years prior, meaning we had to backtrack and head on the northern rim in order to reach Sapporo, which was tough luck for us! Dennis was at the rendezvous. In one of those spectacular rescue operations the road has made commonplace to us, he introduced his bike mechanic, translated the whole transaction in ordering a couple of new downhill rims — we anticipated that mine would split in the next few months when we would be in Far East Russia where such commodities are no longer available — and got them both mounted. The elevator doors to Dennis’ eighth-floor pad were swung wide open for us and we moved in for a week of clean-up, fixing, communication, great food and nights on the town. A full reset of sorts! Hokkaido’s largest city (population: two million) was in full summer fever with beer gardens, street food and shiny, happy people all over —lots of fun! Hokkaido is also renowned for its lavender fields. In the 1960s and ’70s with the arrival of lower-priced, imported lavender, there was a decrease in demand for Hokkaido lavender, leading the local fields to shift from production to tourist attraction. Riding through the scented psychedelic countryside of Furano and Biei, on the way up to and down from the Tokachi-dake area of Daisetsuzan National Park, could not have been a more scenic ride. A fantastic walk up to the summit of Tokachi-dake itself (2,077 metres) in a volcanically tortured landscape, followed by a battery of soaks in the scalding Fukiage onsen completed yet another picture-perfect volcanic episode. Mark, one of Dennis’ gaijin (alien) buddies, was waiting for us at his home in Asahikawa, right in the middle of the island. Born in Adelaide, Australia, the self-professed “snowboard junkie” had 128 days of skiing under his belt for the year . . . and counting. Although Asahikawa is Hokkaido’s second-largest city, our sightseeing of it included only a game of park golf — esthetically resembling a sport somewhere between golf and croquet — followed by nachos and Coopers beer at The Den, Mark’s own bar in the downtown entertainment district. After saying good-bye — and see you in a winter not too distant! — to our new friend, we leaned over our handlebars and sat up only when we had reached Wakkanai, Japan’s northernmost city. From here, we would take a ferry to visit the volcanically active Rishiri Island and, a week later, a ferry to Sakhalin Island in Russia, hub for our “cyclovolcanic” patrols of Kamchatka Peninsula and Kuril Islands. Fast-forward three months and we were back at the international ferry terminal in Wakkanai after a trying and eventful trip in Russia’s Far East — see the Pedal May 2009 issue. Our friend from Taiwan, J.J. and his loaded fold-away bike, met us for an October ride through Hokkaido’s “Wild East.” After we had rounded Cape Soya, Japan’s northernmost point, Highway #238 followed the Sea of Okhotsk coast to Monbetsu and Abashiri. On most days, the wind blew us off the shoulder with Patagonian strength. In the company of his Canadian friends, J.J. found courage to face increasingly cold nights and the ubiquitous brown-bear menace. When one says says “brown bear” in Japan, one thinks Shiretoko Peninsula, the island’s wildest terrain. The protruding arm into the Sea of Okhotsk (“the end of the Earth” according to the Ainu people, Hokkaido’s first settlers) was declared a U.N.E.S.C.O. World Heritage Site www.pedalmag.com
in 2005 for being the southernmost point where sea ice forms in the Northern Hemisphere. But its biggest draw is its abundance of unique flora and large populations of red fox, Sitka deer, eagles, seals, cetaceans and Amur brown bears. Our great ambition to walk and ride on the many trails of its eponymous national park was crushed when we learned that most of the park was officially and strictly off-limits due to “bear activity.” The main highway over Shiretoko Pass offered excellent views of Rausu-dake, one of the peninsula’s two active volcanoes, along with Japan’s Shiretoko-Iwo-zan and Russia’s Kunashir Island. We paused and snacked at the summit, enjoying the vista while relishing being on Hokkaido. We remembered that just weeks before this particular ascent, we had stood on volcanic, desolate, rundown — and disputed — Kunashir Island and, in eager anticipation of our return to Hokkaido, we had seen, across the Nemuro Strait, clean Japanese cars moving on perfectly maintained highways. We drooled with a longing for Japan’s convenience stores with their abundant supplies of fresh onigiris, bento boxes and asahis and wished there was a bridge or a direct ferry that could take us directly back to this gem of a touring destination!
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