Hokkaido Countryside

We found a tiny house on Airbnb near Chitose, about 30 mins from Sapporo by train. Picked up rental car (including the obligatory “follow the guy holding a flag to the bus”) and away we go.

Day one took us in search of cherry blossoms but what we found was that the country side south of Sapporo is packed full of racehorse farms and training facilities. Huge properties of precisely fenced, rolling green hills dotted with magnificent stables and covered tracks (because they get so much snow here). One enormous collection of blue & white buildings, including an 1100 meter covered straight track belongs to the Darley Stud (of Saudi-owned Goldophin fame). Amazing.

On our second road trip attempt to find cherry blossoms (somewhat disappointing, we missed the peak bloom time), we passed a park-like field with people playing what looked like a cross between croquet and mini golf. 🤔 Stopped in for the craic and discovered Park Golf. What a blast. I chuckled at the 65meter par four and several groups of middle-aged adults fully outfitted in park golf gear, complete with fanny packs (sorry, bum bags for you non-Americans) and custom clubs. Chuckles aside, it’s not an easy game—you really have to whack that ball and hope for the best given the narrow “fairways” and bumpy ground. Best part? The hole is about 8” (20cm) wide!

Driving is no problem here although the speed limits are SLOW and SLOWER. Our drive took us by a caldera lake—Lake Shikotsu—surrounded by five volcanos. The depth of the lake gets to 1200' and the water doesn't freeze in the winter because of the volcanic activity.

This area is also chock-a-block with golf courses—hooray! We’ve played twice so far—both good courses and not that expensive: 18 holes, rental clubs, golf cart and lunch with a drink for just over $100. Since we tied our golf match yesterday we are going to play another round of Park Golf today to see who gets the winner’s trophy. Go ME. (Caroline edit: I won. Haha. Loser. 😂)

RE: food, not a lot to report. We have been cooking at the Airbnb. We did discover a different twist on breakfast though—kimchi egg scramble. Yummy. The supermarkets have lots of veggies, almost all packaged in portions for 1, maybe 2 meals. There are baked sweet potatoes in a warmer in the produce section and strawberries are $4 for 7-8 individual berries. Yikes. Sushi is beautiful, abundant, and pretty inexpensive—$6 for 8-10 slices of tuna sashimi. Surprisingly, most of the tuna is from the Mediterranean near Malta. Cheese is also very much NOT a thing. There’s some shredded mozzarella (for those crazy adventurers trying their hand at homemade pizza) but almost everything else is individually-wrapped little pieces of white cheese like an American-Cheddar blend.

Our host, Kazu, is hilarious. He comes in everyday to water the plants and feed the fish and he LOVES a good chat. This is his home when he’s not renting it out, so we’re thinking maybe he’s either lonely or appreciative of the time away from his Mom’s house (or just really friendly!). That said, he’s been super helpful with suggestions for places to go and even did a load of laundry for us and drove us to/from dinner our first night (drunk driving is so taboo that restaurants will not serve everyone at the table alcohol until they’ve confirmed they have a ride).

As of this report we will be staying here for another three nights because someone didn't book the train to Kyoto in time and it’s a holiday weekend. (Caroline edit: SOMEONE likes it here and is not racing to go to another big city.)

https://ipgaa.com/what-is-park-golf
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_ShikotsuLue lisää