Sunday, 19 October 2025

First day on the ground in Japan and it was always going to be a lazy day with no plans and not much activity. If there was any pre-planning it was that I might go to the zoo in the afternoon but the view from my hotel window changed that.

View out my hotel window

I can hear the trains trundle by on their way to/from the station, on the other side of the hotel, but the foliage on the trees made me decide that a little walk to that hill was in order.

Pleasant walk along the river

It was a pleasant walk along the river heading for this bridge. I would guess that the river floods a lot and sometimes the lower levels here are in the river but not today.

Chubetsu River looking pretty

As a walking tool Apple Maps does a better job than Google maps as after I crossed the river Google was only showing roads within the park while Apple included the trails too so I knew there was a staircase up to Kamikawa shrine and an extensive series of trails within Kaguraoka Park.

Stairs to Kamikawa Shrine

Does the Shrine make the trees show off?

Not just the trees showing off

And then close to the main building there was this tree.

Not trying to stand out at all

In Costa Rica there were hummingbirds doing crazy acrobatics and in Hokkaido there are these fearless birds.

Don’t let me interrupt you

I assume there were tasty bugs in the bark of this tree and a crazy tourist with a camera wasn’t going to be an obstacle. Like the hummingbirds it moved fast, mostly running around and up and down the tree trunk.

The walk back on the other side of the river had be passing more trees that were showing off.

Winter is coming but admire me first

And a few in the park alongside the river

The tree colour encourages me that my timing isn’t too bad. I think the autumn leaves are done in the mountains in central Hokkaido but here in the lower elevations there are still green leaves. I head to the area around Biei tomorrow (I’ve hired a taxi for the day) which is a favoured stomping ground of one of the people I met on my trip to Myanmar. Sadly she’s in India at the moment.

Walking back to the train station to take a look inside I found this utility cover, Asahikawa is known for the zoo and the polar bears and penguins there.

One of Asahikawa’s utility covers

I was going to have Ramen for dinner tonight but the place I walked to had a line out the front. Might be a good sign, maybe it was just good promotion on Google, but in any I decided to keep walking and eventually at the furthest reaches of my walk I found this burger diner.

A cute little burger joint

I know, come to Japan and then eat American food but it was empty and after coming past it a second time I started by walk back down the street I thought I would try it.

I did say it was tiny

Just two tables and the area where the waitress was standing for dine in patrons. Another guy came in while I was eating but busy it wasn’t, still it was cosy and the burger was very tasty (they only do burgers and all but one are beef burgers).

A tasty meal

Did I mention it was called Jurasic Burger, hence the dinos on the table. The glass is a Suntory gin and (yuzu) soda, because Japan 🙂

So that’s it for day 3. Tomorrow is the first of the crazy days. Tomorrow’s weather forecast is cloudy with frequent scattered showers or snow flurries, max 8C. Same sort of forecast for Wakkanai on Tuesday.