This trip was rescheduled from last summer to 8/24-9/9/2021. Thankfully our tickets are refundable should we need to do so. I have some accommodations in mind that we had booked initially in 2020 – though I haven’t bothered starting to re-book. This is our second trip to Japan, but first time in Hokkaido.
Previously we hadn’t planned on a car rental, but think that we will for this reschedule (whether that be in ’21 or ’22).
That said, I would love to get some feedback and suggestions!
Land Haneda on 8/25 @ 5am -> Flight to Sapporo landing around 9am.
Train to Sapporo stay **8/25-8/30 + a few days at the end of the trip**
* Clock tower
* Chocolate factory
* Odori park
* Sapporo TV tower
* Beer musuem
* Mt. Moiwayama
* Nijo Ichiba
* Morenuma
Otaru -**Day trip from Sapporo on 8/30**
* Visit Yoichi distillery
* Walk the canal & do some shopping
* Pick up car in Sapporo
Noboribetsu – **8/30-8/31 (Add a day?)**
* Take the long way to stop by lake Shikotsu?
* If we add a day, perhaps stay near lake Shikotsu
* Check in to Bourou Noguchi Noboribetsu
* Kuttara-ko
* Oyunuma river
* Jigoku-dani
Furano/Bei – **Debating a night or just a day trip**
* Cheese factory
* Melon farm
* Any specific one to check out?
* Ningle terrace
* Aoike blue pond
* Is this worth visiting, or is there a different place we should go?
Daisetsuzan National Park – **9/1-9/3**
* Stay at a hotel with private onsen
* I have a lot of tattoos and body scars, so a room with a private onsen or one we can reserve is needed – suggestions welcomed! So far Hotel Taisetsu has caught my eye (it appears almost entirely booked on Agoda when I was looking for rates, but I assume it’s just too early to look)
* Hike!
* We are used to high elevation (we are from CO, living at 7.5k and used to hiking up to 14k) and daily hikes up to 13 miles – any specific hikes we MUST check out?
* Search for falls
Asahikawa – **9/3-9/6**
* Asahiyama Zoo
* Romantic road
* Otokoyama Sake brewery
* Furarito alley
* Pottery village
* Kaimono Koen for shopping
Sapporo – Return car on arrival, use public transport. **Depart on 9/9 to Haneda by 1pm**
* Do / eat at any places we didn’t get to before
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Is there anything we should cut / add? Should we stretch the trip further and go more north? We love the outdoors and FOOD, any suggested places to see or swap out – or amazing places we must eat? (No restrictions, we eat everything). Budget is comfortable (6k-8k after flights) since we’ve been able to just keep on saving.
Edited to move itinerary around and clarifications
Thanks you guys!
11 comments
Jozankei seems interesting as a onsen stop, but you already have two good one, Otaru and Noboribetsu where you did not note onsen. So if only for a onsen, I would look for one in those places first, especially if you stop for the night. If you do stop at a ryokan with dinner included, keep in mind check-in is often up to 5 or 6pm only and breakfast can be served around 8, so you have to take that into account in the schedule of the day (at what time you drive between city, etc). But you can also decide to go for no meal plan at the ryokan or get day use of their onsen.
If you decide on Jozankei, then here is a list of place that have onsen and some do have private bath. Day use for onsen is usually much more limited than if you stay at the hotel/ryokan, so you have to keep that in mind. [https://jozankei.jp/en/spa](https://jozankei.jp/en/spa)
If anything, I think that Otaru can be done by public transport as a day trip from Sapporo. I feel it would be cheaper than the car rental too. Especially if you go to a brewery and they have tasting available, you do not have to worry about tasting too much if you do not drive.
My take on these plans:
1. I would group Otaru plans together with Sapporo days – it absolutely makes no sense whatsoever to visit Otaru and even Yoichi Distillery and hire a car (Yoichi Distillery is about 10 minute walk from Yoichi Station), especially with a tasting at the end of distillery tour. That said, you might want to look at Shakotan Peninsula in late summer as it is very underestimated area of the island.
2. With your plans: it may actually make sense to hire a car in Sapporo (or perhaps even at Shin-Chitose Airport to avoid having to go back to Sapporo at the end of your trip), spend two days in Lake Shikotsu/Lake Toya/Noboribetsu Onsen and at the end of the day drive to Furano and do your Furano/Biei, Daisetsuzan/Asahikawa itinerary in reverse. In fact, if you intend to come in Late August, regardless of actual year – it might worthwhile to start with Furano/Biei as end of August is end of season for flower farms viewing etc.
3, As to extending your trip: unless you are willing to fly to Rishiri – it really does not make a lot of sense to extend the trip up north or east – you may possibly spend more time than originally planned in Daisetsuzan area, or drive south visiting Lake Toya area, Omura Koen, Matsumae and Hakodate.
Here are my thoughts/comments as a Hokkaido native (well, sort of – I was born here, but grew up in the US and recently moved back here).
I would maybe cut down one of the days in Sapporo and add an extra day at noboribetsu to just do nothing and enjoy the scenery.
On your first day in Sapporo, you can probably knock out a lot of those things on your list: Odori Park, clock tower, Sapporo Tower, Beer Museum, and maybe Mt. Moiwayama. The rest can be done on the second day. The chocolate factory may not be worth it unless you really really wanted to see it. It’s probably worth maybe an hour of things to see but it’s sort of out of the way and not necessarily worth the drive. They have a better exhibit/factory at CTS Airport.
If you’re into shopping, you can spend a day or maybe just the afternoon at Sapporo Station. Even if you’re not into shopping, it still might be worth it to check out. They will often have special displays at the Daimaru Department Store. And since you mentioned food, there are plenty of great places to eat at/around Sapporo Station.
I didn’t look too closely at the rest of your itinerary but it looks fine.
There aren’t that many high peaks in Hokkaido so elevation shouldn’t be a concern for you. Trails here might be a little bit different that what you’re used to, but nothing to be concerned about. There are various combinations of technical hikes and walk-in-the-park type of hikes. I don’t necessarily have any specific recommendations for hikes, but check out [this link](https://hokkaidowilds.org/hike) for a good list of trails. AllTrails also has some listings.
The 5 initial days in Sapporo seems a bit long. You can probably cover most of the sights there in 2 days, maybe 3 to give yourself some buffer.
Add another day to Daisetsuzan, especially if you like hiking and if you’re there for autumn leaves, it’s stunning.
The Kurodake rope way and then hike up the mountain starts at Sounkyo where there’s a bunch of onsens. There is also a hike from there over to Asahidake over a couple days. If you’re there for the autumn leaves, Ginsendai is beautiful.
At Asahidake, there’s another rope way with a hike up a mountain. If that’s a bit too much hill, there’s a few others up there that circle around a bit (they spear off from the circle/touristy easy walk, sorry can’t remember which one exactly). Hiking up and down the top and bottom of the ropeway is a decent hike, don’t believe the hostel guy when he says it’s an easy hour walk 🙂 K’s hostel has a little onsen, they might be a bit more lenient with tattoos and they have heaps of info on hiking in the area.
I haven’t been for years but I remember Shikotsu being beautiful, not as built up as Toya and some of the other onsen towns.
I’d recommend the otaru music box museum, it’s such a magical place!
If you like beer, Maltheads is a really cool little spot, the owner is very friendly and their selection is top-notch and very international. Yamaneko is a great multi-cuisine restaurant. British Pub Darwin is AMAZING. Beer Bar North Island has their own microbrewery.
Aoi Ike Pond is beautiful, and the waterfall from where the water comes from isn’t that far off. While the waterfall isn’t as ‘pretty’ during the summer time, Aoi Ike seems to be beautiful all year round with the water reflecting different shades of blue depending on the season and time of the day.
For food, I’d suggest looking up Steak&Hamburg HIGE, Kane-chan for yakiniku, and don’t forget the seafood markets! Otaru is also known for its seafood, so hit up the seafood market there too.
The cheese factory is honestly eh, but the melons during the summer are so sweet you’ll wonder how it’s even naturally possible.
Random thoughts:
Stay for the night in Furano/Biei. The places are scattered around and even if the towns are very small, they’re spread out and it takes time to get to the factories and getting the bus is tricky sometimes (edit: read too quickly, didn’t saw you were renting a car. Than maybe is doable in a day, but I’d take it easy and stay for the night)
Also in Sapporo I recommend Nakajima park and Historical village. Superpretty place where to hang out. Also check out the university grounds if you like nature: not pretty as Nakajima, but I was kinda envious at what a nice campus it was xD (also they have a gingko avenue there, but I don’t think there’s going to be autumn foliage that soon :/)
We enjoyed the Ishiya chocolate factory a ton, since we always bring back their white chocolate cookies from the airport. They sell a few items you can’t get anywhere else including a delicious canned chocolate drink. The grounds are pretty scenic, but you won’t regret anything by skipping the tour.
Sept 2021 is a hail mary in all honesty considering Japan is way behind in vaccination efforts. A safer bet would be Feb-Apr 2022