Due to the earthquake, some train lines between Kushiro and northern Hokkaido aren’t running. So we took the train the long way around, all the way back through Sapporo, followed by a bus to Sounkyo Onsen. It’s a cute little town nestled in a valley by Daisetsuzan National Park. Our first full day, we took the gondola and chairlift up to the start of a long hike around a crater. The hike surpassed our expectations!
The initial gondola is followed by an off-season ski lift. We got on before taking a look and then felt ridiculous being slowly tugged along a few feet off the flat ground. We were happy to have it on the way back down to rest our feet though!
A pika and a chipmunk are the mascots of this area and we were greeted by this little guy as we exited the chairlift.
The hike started out with a 1+ hour straight climb, but the rest of the hike was relatively flat around a volcanic crater (which still had a bit of a sulphur smell). The trail makes it up above 2,300 meters, so we both had light headaches from the altitude. The changing landscapes along the entire hike was incredible!
When a pika is near, you hear a birdlike chirp. After hearing them forever, we finally saw a few sitting on rocks.
Skiing is possible here until June! This year they apparently got an early snow in August. So basically, it’s like Siberia up here. Huge chunks of snow and ice clung to the mountain, and meltwater had carved caves into them.
We met another hiker at the hostel in the evening after the hike, so we spent the next day exploring Kogen Onsen (also in Daisetsuzan) with him. This area is basically the first place in Japan to get autumn color on the trees. Despite it being a rainy day it felt like we came at the perfect time. Our new buddy said it looked like fruity pebbles, which was a pretty apt description.
The trail around Kogen Onsen is pretty easy and brings you from pond to beautiful pond. It is apparently bear habitat as we had to listen to a bear safety talk before going on the hike. Yes, it was all in Japanese so we had no idea what to beware of. We felt very safe though because the trail was packed with people, huge groups (30+ people) of senior citizens. And almost every Japanese hiker had bear bells on their packs so there was a constant jingling noise along the trail, haha. After talking to a few it became clear that many of them come to Daisetsuzan twice per year to see the fall colors and spring flowers. Everyone was really nice (of course, it’s Japan) and happy to see three Americans enjoying their park.
The scenery was breathtakingly beautiful.
Priscilla had heard about the start of an Autumn festival that evening, so we went to a calligraphy talk show (we had no idea what to expect) followed by an Ainu demonstration. The calligraphy was pretty neat to watch, though we had no idea what was going on, and the calligrapher was very entertaining with his sparkling attire and personality! We also got singled out to participate in the Ainu dance, which was a bit challenging at first since we couldn’t understand the directions. Got the hang of it, eventually.
Highlights of Daisetsuzan National Park and Sounkyo Onsen:
- Loop hike up to Mt. Kurodake and then around the Volcanic Group crater. It was really long, but even more rewarding.
- Coming in mid-late September was just perfect to see amazing color in Kogen Onsen
- Meeting so many nice people. The hostel was (surprisingly) filled with older people who are regulars to the area. Everyone was up for a chat.
This is all so stunningly beautiful and really interesting. It looks like there’s something new and amazing to see at every turn. Also, we like the bear photobombing your bear safety class 🙂
Haha, yeah they had a bunch of stuffed bears. We imagined all the dots on the map were bear spottings.