Lake Toya

A trip to Lake Toya and the surrounding area has been on my Hokkaido bucket list pretty much since the day we found out we were coming here. The huge crater lake with its perfectly centered islands along with all of the volcanic and geological history in the area made me eager to see it all in person. Despite his disappointed willingness to miss many of our adventures, Jason was certain he didn't want to miss this one, so we had been waiting and strategizing looking for a weekend with nice weather, an available car to rent, and time in Jason's schedule. Last weekend we hit the trifecta and set out on the two hour drive south along with Sky, the postdoc visiting from Jason's group in Boston.

Our first stop of the day was at Usuzan Ropway. The area is probably best described through this map provided at the visitor's center:

The parking lot and access to the gondola are located between the two very interesting peaks of Mt. Usu and Mt. Showa Shinzan. Below is the insanely fascinating Mt. Showa Shinzan (literally, the name means "Showa new mountain," named because the mountain formed during a time known as the Showa period). Here's the most amazing part - the entire mountain formed, all 1,306 ft, between December 28, 1943 and September 1945. The entire area below was flat wheat fields as of December 28, 1943 and less than two years later, this was the new landscape. That means that, on average, the mountain grew nearly two feet a day. It's just crazy to think about.

Documentation of Mt. Showa Shinzan's growth indicates that it happened in three phases. For roughly the first six months, earthquakes frequently (sometimes as often as 200 times per DAY!) rocked the area causing the land to begin to rise. On June 22, 1944, there were about 250 earthquakes in one day which caused to land to rise by five feet in a single day. The following day, smoke started rising from the fissured ground, beginning the second phase - the eruption phase - of growth. Over the next four months there would be 17 major eruptions, countless minor eruptions, seven volcanic craters would form, and on some days the mountain grew by as much as six and a half feet. Finally, for nearly a year from November of 1944 to September of 1945, the mountain entered its final phase of growth. During this time, all eruption activity stopped and a lava dome began to take shape. In September of 1945 all earthquake activity also halted and the formation of Mt. Showa Shinzan was complete. Although there has been no further eruptions since, it still continues to smoke to this day. 

But I haven't told you what might be the most interesting bit yet. When Showa Shinzan began forming, Japan was deep into WWII. It was believed by Japanese authorities and the military that it might be interpreted as an unlucky wartime omen and so its entire existence was kept secret - so secret that even the government did not monitor its formation and growth. And so, most of the information about its growth was meticulously monitored and documented by Macao Mimatsu, a local postmaster who devised ingenious methods for taking measurements to record its progress. 

So, what's the verdict? Am I just a closet geography nerd, or is that some seriously fascinating stuff?!

After marveling at one wonder of nature, we boarded the gondola for a ride to the top of Showa Shinzan's neighboring volcano - Mt. Usu.

Unlike its neighbor, Mt. Usu is still an active volcano which erupted in 1910, 1943-1945, 1977-1978, and most recently, in 2000. The 1977-1978 eruptions completely changed the landscape of the area and sign boards near the gondola showed impressive before and after pictures. This eruption also completely destroyed a local village - the ruins which have been left as a part of the areas Volcanic Science Museum.

The peak of Mt. Usu after getting off the gondola:

The main crater basin observation deck is a short 10 minute walk from the gondola along a wide, paved path:

It was a little hazy, but from the observation deck we could see in the distance both Mt. Showa Shinzan on the right and the shore of Lake Toya on the left.

This picture from the observation deck into the volcanic crater just really doesn't begin to show how impressive it was:

From the observation deck, we started down outer rim trail. This is where things got really cool, but oddly, where we left every other tourist visiting the volcano behind. We hiked for close to two hours and saw less than a dozen other hikers.

To be fair, the stairs were nothing to scoff at, but look at that! They lead your right down INTO the crater! How could you be that close and not explore further?

At some point we approached what looked like the edge of a cliff:

Lucky for us, it just turned out to be more stairs down. Eventually they led us to this lookout into the main volcanic crater. You really can't tell by the picture, but it's a depressed crater sunken within the larger crater around which we were walking.

From there we continued on further down into the crater. Eventually we would climb up again and pop up on that outer rim ridge which would be our path for the rest of the hike.

If you really look closely at the picture below which was taken from the outer rim trail, you can see a straight line running down the distant mountains - about at the center of the picture. These are the stairs we went down when descending into the crater.

Walking the outer rim trail:

The butterflies are PROLIFIC in Hokkaido. Never have I every been anywhere (save a butterfly garden) where they are so numerous and colorful. This means by default that we have also seen some of the most amazing caterpillars here:

As we rounded the crater we kept spotting more and more smoking fissures:

Eventually we realized that the smoke wasn't just coming from inside the crater, but that there were actually vents on the other side - the outer wall - as well:

Up until we reached the outermost allowed point on the crater rim we had hazy, but still pretty good visibility. But very quickly some think clouds started rolling in nearly obscuring Mt Usu completely and the crater:

Being that the views at the outermost point were so obscured, this was probably the coolest part of that area - hundreds and hundreds of butterflies! The only that could possibly make the animation below better would be if I had captured the joy filled giggles bubbling out of her as she ran through:

And as I mentioned, the butterflies were stunning!

Apparently there is some danger of running into bears on the trail, but I did my best not to think about it because that was a pretty narrow rim we were walking on and there really wouldn't have been anywhere to go if we'd run into one...

As we hiked, the large cloud we had been in passed and the views back to Mt. Usu and out over the Pacific both improved:

Finally, we made it back to the final, loooong set of stairs that would take us up out of the crater. Fiona and I counted - there were 600 and that didn't include probably another 100 more separate from this intense, never ending set.

Fiona and I powered our way up with Jason and Sky took their time, too engrossed in their science talk to turn up the power for the climb.

Once we made it to the top of the stairs, having arrived again at the main crater observation deck, we turned to have one last look before heading back to the gondola and this was all we saw - another wall of cloud! We were all the more grateful for our hazy, yet still visible skies!

After all that morning hiking, we were ready for lunch. One of the traditional Japanese dishes that was still remaining on Jason's eating bucket list was kaisen don, a sashimi rice bowl, so we decided on a restaurant that served this - known specifically for its scallops - and offered great views over Lake Toya.

My soba noodles with mountain vegetables was okay...I think I've come to the conclusion that I don't love soba...

Jason devoured every bit of his kaisen don plus scallop soup, and Fiona plowed through a pile of scallops and rice as well.

After lunch, we enjoyed the view of Lake Toya...

...before boarding a ferry for Nakajima island at the center of the lake.

The ferry eventually passed through this narrow channel before docking around the top of the island on the left (Nakajima) to let us off. There are actually a cluster of five islands in the center of Toya, but Nakajima is the largest and the only one accessible by ferry. As we passed the island on the right, we spotted a deer with huge antlers watching us from the shores.

After docking at Nakajima island and making our way through the partially developed park area, we signed in at the visitor's center for permission to access the rest of the island and began another hike.

At the visitor's center, we picked up this crude map and were most intrigued by and interested to find the spot indicating, "Cool wind comes from the holes":

And so we set out through the towering pine trees in search of some cool wind holes...

Not far past the steps pictured below Fiona shouted, "LOOK!" as she pointed up in the trees. She had managed to spot a group of at least 6 owls swooping back and forth between branches - not exactly thrilled that we were there, but also not in any hurry to move on. We must have stood watching them for a good ten minutes - it was so neat to see them in the wild. Especially so many of them all together!

We continued to hike through a grassy clearing where, on a more clear day we would have been able to see Mt. Yotei in the distance, before we finally reached the end of the trail having not found any cool wind holes.

Determined to find the mysterious holes on our return hike, we turned around and headed back. It was ultimately Sky who stopped in the middle of the trail at one point and said, "Wait! I feel something cool." I thought he was just joking because we could see no holes anywhere, but finally, after some searching, we found them! Smallish openings in the largely rock trail side that did in fact have a cold breeze coming out of them. It was like all natural AC. And the breeze wasn't faint - it was strong enough to cause the leaves and grasses near the openings to sway. Incredible! I have no idea what the explaination is behind the phenomenon, but it was cool.

After cooling off a bit in nature's AC, we continued on to the shore line which we hiked along until we returned to the ferry terminal.

Fiona was over the moon that we managed to catch the "castle ferry" (we had missed it after lunch) for the trip back.

Just as we were disembarking from the ferry, we looked back toward Toya's central islands one last time and were rewarded with a surprise clearing and a very faint peak at Mt. Yotei for the fairest time all day!

And for our last stop before heading home - a truly surprising and special treat. One of the most popular places to visit in Hokkaido is the Furano/Biei area. Most people would consider it a crime to be in Hokkaido for a week and not go - I'm sure not visiting over the course of more than two months is unheard of. The area is famous because it is nothing but mile after mile of beautifully colored flower fields that bloom from late June to mid-July. It was initially on my Hokkaido bucket list, but as I researched it further I discovered that it was going to be roughly six hours round trip and all I could envision was getting there and having Fiona say something along the lines of, "They're so pretty! Now what are we going to do?" Jason wasn't particularly enthusiastic about it either, so I reluctantly crossed it off my list. Well, that's a long winded introduction to the fact that we actually discovered beautiful sunflower fields in Toya. I was so excited to have satisfied my flower field desire in combination with such a fun day for every one else. Victory!

By the time we made it back to Sapporo, we were all exhausted, but thrilled with all of the day's adventures. There was just one last thing for Jason to do - return our awesome ride which we affectionately nicknamed "the box." These things are everywhere here. I do have to say it was surprisingly roomy, despite not being much to look at.