Hokkaido

Author: Edutraveller
Date written: 04/18/2003 07:58:55 PM
Last edited: 2003/05/04 12:44:10
Keywords: Hokkaido, Japan regional guide, Guide to Japan, Northern Japan, Japan travel guide

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Hokkaido

The Hokkaido region. Hokkaido is the farthest north of the four main islands that make up Japan and a popular destination for Japanese tourists as well as foreigners.

Hokkaido epitomises the nature and the great outdoors in Japan. No other part of the country has weather as severe, or as much space and unspoilt wilderness. One of the last areas of the Japanese archipelago to be colonised by the Japanese, Hokkaido was peopled mostly by emigrants from the Tokyo area during the final years of the Tokugawa shogunate and the start of the Meiji Restoration. This resulted in the displacement of the indigenous Ainu people who had occupied Hokkaido and parts of Sakhalin for thousands of years (see below for more details about the Ainu). It also means that almost everyone in Hokkaido speaks standard Japanese, despite the distance from the capital.

The island, the second-largest of those that make up Japan, is roughly square in shape, covering some 80,000 square kilometres of which 70% is forested. Although this is nearly 20% of the total area of Japan, just less than 5% of the Japanese population live there giving Hokkaido one of the lowest population densities in the country. This may in part be attributed to the harsh winters (annual snowfall reaches nearly six metres on the Sea of Japan coast - see below for more details of the weather).

Hokkaido has been a crossroads for Japanese and Russian merchants for some time, and still bears the historical marks of the herring trade, once plied from Otaru: Russian churches and other buildings, western-style houses, and so on. With ample nature reserves and parks also there to please most types of traveller, a lot of the warmth of Hokkaido can be found in its people - make sure you put Hokkaido on your map.

Getting there

Airports in Hokkaido. Flying is generally cheaper than the train, if you can find a special deal during the off-season. Click for larger image.

Flights: the most common route to Hokkaido is to fly to Sapporo (New Chitose) from Tokyo (Haneda Airport) - the busiest route in the world according to the Hokkaido prefectural government. However, there are plenty of other flights from major and minor airports around Japan to many other locations in Hokkaido; you can fly to New Chitose (SPK), Wakkanai (WKJ), Memanbetsu (MMB), Asahikawa (AKJ), Nemuro Nakashibetsu (SHB), Kushiro (KUH), Obihiro (OBO), and Hakodate (HKD) from various parts of Japan. International flights to Honolulu, Hong Kong, Seoul, Guam, Saipan and Cairns are also possible from New Chitose, and the rest of the world through either Kansai (KIX) or Tokyo Narita (NRT). IF you are coming from the other end of Japan, then it will almost certainly be cheaper to fly than take the shinkansen (and a lot quicker: flights are about 90 minutes from Tokyo, while the train will take you 17 hours).

Ferry ports in Hokkaido. Although some ferries occasionally stop at other ports as well (such as Kushiro), you will have difficulty finding one and will have a lot more choice to and from these ports. Click for larger image.

Train: If you do prefer the train, then you will probably take a shinkansen from Tokyo (Tohoku shinkansen) to Morioka in Aomori, where you change to the limited express to Hakodate or Sapporo (goes through the Seikan Tunnel). There is also a sleeper train, but this is beyond the budget of most travellers at over 30,000 yen per person one-way. As with flights, you may sometimes get bargains from cheap ticket offices (find them in most major cities near train stations).

Ferry: Definitely the cheapest way to get to Hokkaido from Tokyo or other parts of Japan, is by boat. Ferries leave regularly from Ooarai (a little to the north of Tokyo) for Tomakomai (not far from Sapporo), and there are also ferries to and from Muroran to Ooarai, between Hakodate and Aomori, and between Otaru and Iwanai on Hokkaido and Naoetsu on Honshu. These will take around 20 to 24 hours and cost about 6,000 yen per person (cheapest seat).

Weather

Hokkaido is the coldest part of Japan, and sees the most snow of any part of Japan (between four and six metres a year, more than almost any urban area in the world). Temperatures are below zero degrees centigrade for most of the long winter, and regularly exceed ten degrees below freezing. This combination makes for some of the best and the most reliable snow in Japan and Hokkaido is a popular skiing, snowboarding and cross-country skiing destination.

The less-severe typhoon season in Hokkaido shows through in better sunshine during the summer, but the heavy snow in the winter means grey skies for that time of year. Some claim that Hokkaido doesn't really have a typhoon season; get caught in one and you'll realise the fallacy of that idea. The truth is that typhoons slowly pass further and further north as the year progresses, so fewer tend to make it to Hokkaido or arrive later in the year. Anyway, be prepared for them as usual.

Hokkaido has a lot to offer at any time of year. In the winter, skiing and snowboarding complement a wealth of onsen (hot spring) and some of the best food and seafood in Japan. Summers are cool and dry, with temperatures in the low twenties centigrade - a welcome break from the heat of the rest of Japan and ideal for hiking, cycling and camping. Spring and Autumn are generally brief, but again are good times to see Hokkaido.

Things to see

Hokkaido is best known for food (especially crab and other seafood) and onsen (hot springs), particularly in winter. If you are in Hokkaido at the beginning of February (usually during the second week of the month) make sure you don't miss the Sapporo Snow Festival (Yuki Matsuri), a world-famous event that brings teams from around the world to compete building an enormous range and variety of sculptures, some of them truly immense in scale. Never mind if you miss it as there is plenty in Japan's fifth-largest city to keep you occupied during the rest of the year. Sapporo offers its own version of a staple of the Japanese diet, ramen (like instant noodles, but much better). Sapporo miso-ramen uses miso (a fermented soybean paste) as the soup base instead of pork-stock or soy sauce, and is excellent on a cold winter day.

Sapporo is a new city, constructed shortly after the Meiji Restoration of 1868 on a grid pattern under the guidance of an American architect. This makes it a little easier to get around, particularly using the Clock Tower constructed in 1868 as your landmark. While here, it is worth seeing the Sapporo Beer Garden, original home of Sapporo Brewery the oldest brewery in Japan. It is also worth visiting the Old Prefectural Office and nearby Hokkaido University Botanical Garden which also houses an Ainu Museum. If you are here overnight, take the cablecar up Mount Moiwa to see the Sapporo lights by night. The tourist information office in the main station has free maps of the city detailing these and other places.

Hakodate is another common entry point to Hokkaido, and well worth a couple of days. In the west of the city, worth seeing is Hakodate by night from the top of Mount Hakodate. If you have time, the Old British Consulate (with Union Jack but no longer a consulate) has a tea room (the British kind) and miniture replicas of Commadore Perry's Black Ships that forced the opening of Japan in the mid 1800s. An old Russian Church attests to other cultural influences. The bay area has several restaurants and seems popular with both locals and tourists. In the area around the station, don't miss the morning market for lively bustle and cheap, fresh food. Goryokaku (five-sided fort) was the first western-style fort to be built in Japan and makes a pleasant few hours' stroll around the gardens. The views of the fort from the nearby Goryokaku tower are worth the entrance fee on a clear day. Nearby Lake Onuma is famous for its 126 small and large islands, connected by 18 bridges.

Near to Hakodate Matsumae boasts well over five thousand cheery trees and a reputation as one of the best places for cherry-blossom viewing in the north of Japan. This is also the old Tokugawa Shogunate's stronghold on Hokkaido (under the Matsumae family) and has a castle (a replica of the original destroyed in 1949 by fire). Across the bay from Hakodate is Lake Toya, south of Sapporo. This hot spring resort reminds you of the origins of the onsen - the nearby volcanoes are still active. The last eruption of Mount Utsu was 31 March 2000, and Shinzan or "new mountain" at 402 metres high was formed in 1945, two years after a large earthquake in the area.

Otaru, a little to the north of Sapporo, is a canal city well-known for glasswork. It's worth a visit and you can try your hand at glass-blowing (for a fee). Asahikawa is still further north and is the second city of Hokkaido. The streets are dotted with sculptures, and the local museum has works by Rodin and other masters. In February the city holds its own Snow Festival, similar to Sapporo's, and in the summer you can see the Ainu Village Festival, reminder of the days when this was a large Ainu settlement.

Kushiro, located on the Pacific coast, is an ideal staging point for the surrounding Kushiro-Shitsugen and Akan National Parks. The area is home to the Japanese crane, and there is lots of camping and hiking to be done in the surrounding hills and marshland. In the centre of Hokkaido, next to the Daisetsuzan National Park is Furano, a small town near some of the best skiing in Hokkaido. You can slso try wine and cheese at the local "wine factory" and "cheese factory". Perhaps this use of words is indicative of something. In summer, the whoel area becomes purple as the lavender crop matures. In the north of the region is Onneyu, a famous onsen, for the weary.

For onsen in general, some of the most famous locations are Noboribetsu in southwestern Hokkaido, Mount E-san on the Pacific Coast, and Jozan-kei Valley just outside Sapporo, but there are many others.

National parks

National and Quasi-National Parks in Hokkaido

Hokkaido is big and it can take a lot of time to get around it all, so if you are on a tight schedule you will have to prioritise what you want to see. Most people arrive near Sapporo or in that part of Hokkaido, so it is a good idea to a short stay on that area. If you are going to be in Hokkaido for longer, consider trips to Rishiri-Rebun-Sarabetsu National Park in the north (although perhaps not in winter), Daisetsuzan National Park in the centre of the island for excellent hiking and skiing, and Kushiro-Shitsugen and Akan National Parks on the east coast. Shiretoko Hanto National Park in the northeast is also easily accessable from Kushiro and well worth a trip (although perhaps a little severe in the winter).

About 14% of the area of Japan (5.3 million hectares) is designated as one of 394 National, Quasi-National of Prefectural parks, and about 13% of that area (715,622 hectares) is in Hokkaido's eleven parks National and Quasi-National Parks. A further 12 smaller Prefectural Parks are dotted around the countryside.

• National Parks:
• 1 Rishiri-Rebun-Sarobetsu: Designated: September 20, 1974 Area: 21,222ha
• 2 Shiretoko: Designated: June 1, 1964 Area: 38,633ha
• 3 Akan: Designated: December 4, 1934 Area: 90,481ha
• 4 Kushiro Shitsugen: Designated: July 31,1987 Area: 26,861ha
• 5 Daisetsuzan: Designated: December 4, 1934 Area: 226,764ha
• 6 Shikotsu-Toya: Designated: May 16, 1949 Area: 99,302ha

• Quasi-National Parks:
• 7 Shokanbetsu-Teuri-Yagishiri: Designated: August 1, 1990 Area: 43,559ha
• 8 Abashiri: Designated: July 1, 1958 Area: 37,261ha
• 9 Niseko-Shakotan-Otaru Kaigan: Designated: July 24, 1963 Area: 19,009ha
• 10 Hidaka Sanmyaku-Erimo: Designated: October 1, 1981 Area: 103,447ha
• 11 Onuma: Designated: July 1, 1958 Area: 9,083ha

Recommended if you can find the time are Rishiri-Rebun-Sarobetsu, Daisetsuzan, Kushiro Shitsugen and Akan, although all the parks are well worth a visit. Remember that access may be difficult, if not impossible, during the winter and that you need to remain flexible in your planning.

Hokkaido Ainu

Ainu (meaning "human" in the Ainu language) inhabited all four major island of Japan, Sakhalin and the Kuril islands. Over time, the Japanese slowly expanded from the south of the country and pushed the Ainu northwards to Hokkaido, Sakhalin, other islands around the north of Japan, and the Amur river region of the Eurasian continent. Here they lived trading between the Japanese and the Manchu area. The Ainu seem to be related to a Caucasian group that existed in Northern Asia several millenia ago, as they do not have many features in common with either the Japanese or other groups in the Amur River delta.

Ainu people wore garments made from cloth derived from tree bark or deerskins, and women wore tattoos around the mouth. They followed a religion centred on the forces of nature, believing them to have souls or spirits. About 24,000 Ainu still remain in Hokkaido, although few if any are pure-blooded Ainu and almost none keep up their traditional culture and language, having been largely assimilated into Japanese society.

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