November 10
But there were no bears
03/11/10 08:19
It wasn’t an official school holiday, just a short
break. But we flew to Hokkaido before it gets too
cold (down to -15 in winter) with the aim of spotting
Stellar’s Sea Eagle and Japanese Cranes.
Stayed the first three nights in a youth hostel just below Mount Ashidake in the Daisetsuzan National Park, which is the biggest in Japan. Fabulous hostel, wonderful food, incredible scenery, though some of the paths are a bit of a scramble even with boots and sticks. The first day was brilliant sunshine, though bitter on the tops. Ashidake is 2200 metres, we didn’t climb to the top. Then it snowed. And snowed and snowed. Six inches in one night. So we fled, heading east away from the Siberian snow to Abashiri and the Shiretoko peninsular, which is probably the wildest place in Japan. Not that you can get in, the road across the top was closed, so was the local youth hostel, and we fled hordes of shivering Chinese tourists and headed down the coast to Nemoro, Shunkinitai and Kushiro wetlands.
The autumn colours were fantastic. The photos don’t really do the scenery justice. Something like 70% of Japan is forested mountains, and in Hokkaido, the proportion is even higher. What is more, much of the forest in eastern Hokkaido is still pristine. So the wild life is pretty extraordinary. Sika deer, foxes, there are notices everywhere warning to beware of bears; white tailed and golden eagles, we might have glimpsed a juvenile Stellar’s but I am not convinced, buzzard and kites galore, harriers and a goshawk, waders, swans, siberian red-throats and the extraordinary Japanese red crowned crane.
We had good views of these huge birds on several occasions. On the last night we were standing on a hill overlooking the giant Kushiro Marsh National Park. We could see five cranes flying and as the sun set, they sent weird wailing calls echoing through the mist in the the valley, like banshees from the bog, calling ghosts from the days before railways and power poles.
It’s a pity the coast is not so beautiful. Ugly concrete and unnecessary coastal defense works. It is an extraordinary feature of Japan that most sublime beauty can be offended by careless, pointless, tasteless, ugly construction. Modern Japanese towns are mostly devoid of any architectural grace or aesthetic quality. Every river is dammed and constrained; every coastal beach piled with tetrapods and hemmed in by walls. How can a society that prides itself in aesthetic tradition allow such monstrosities to foul the landscape?
More pictures in Picasa
Stayed the first three nights in a youth hostel just below Mount Ashidake in the Daisetsuzan National Park, which is the biggest in Japan. Fabulous hostel, wonderful food, incredible scenery, though some of the paths are a bit of a scramble even with boots and sticks. The first day was brilliant sunshine, though bitter on the tops. Ashidake is 2200 metres, we didn’t climb to the top. Then it snowed. And snowed and snowed. Six inches in one night. So we fled, heading east away from the Siberian snow to Abashiri and the Shiretoko peninsular, which is probably the wildest place in Japan. Not that you can get in, the road across the top was closed, so was the local youth hostel, and we fled hordes of shivering Chinese tourists and headed down the coast to Nemoro, Shunkinitai and Kushiro wetlands.
The autumn colours were fantastic. The photos don’t really do the scenery justice. Something like 70% of Japan is forested mountains, and in Hokkaido, the proportion is even higher. What is more, much of the forest in eastern Hokkaido is still pristine. So the wild life is pretty extraordinary. Sika deer, foxes, there are notices everywhere warning to beware of bears; white tailed and golden eagles, we might have glimpsed a juvenile Stellar’s but I am not convinced, buzzard and kites galore, harriers and a goshawk, waders, swans, siberian red-throats and the extraordinary Japanese red crowned crane.
We had good views of these huge birds on several occasions. On the last night we were standing on a hill overlooking the giant Kushiro Marsh National Park. We could see five cranes flying and as the sun set, they sent weird wailing calls echoing through the mist in the the valley, like banshees from the bog, calling ghosts from the days before railways and power poles.
It’s a pity the coast is not so beautiful. Ugly concrete and unnecessary coastal defense works. It is an extraordinary feature of Japan that most sublime beauty can be offended by careless, pointless, tasteless, ugly construction. Modern Japanese towns are mostly devoid of any architectural grace or aesthetic quality. Every river is dammed and constrained; every coastal beach piled with tetrapods and hemmed in by walls. How can a society that prides itself in aesthetic tradition allow such monstrosities to foul the landscape?
More pictures in Picasa