The room was bright at 4.30am in the morning. No joke. Thankfully I was able to get back to sleep and wake up at a more decent time of 6am. Damn still felt feverish. Anyway no choice had to get up and make our way to the Mazda car rental just opposite the JR station. The outlet opens at 8am so we kinda bumped around the station first and saw school kids in sports outfits on a Sunday morning. Since we were at the station we also bought our tickets for the express train to Asahikawa. Originally this would be free under the JR pass but because we could not change our voucher at Narita, we could not use it and the nearest place to exchange is Asahikawa. The cost of the ticket is a cool Y7240 per person and KS was slightly traumatized by it. But no choice la. We had to take the express train at 6.23am to fit into our schedule.


Picked up our car soon after and it was a white 1.3L Mazda Demio. Fit the both of us well though initially the brakes felt a tad sharp. Anyway it had GPS in it making it very convenient to navigate the streets! We paid around Y8500 for it for 8am till 7pm the next day. I reserved it via this website which had internet discounts and they only have Nissan and Mazda outlets. In Japan there are countless car rental companies, mainly run by the manufacturers themselves.

So off we started on our journey to one of the main highlights of this trip, Shiretoko! But before that need to boost our energy first and I stopped at Mister Donut. Haha... even in this outpost at the very north of Japan. I think KS wanted to try something else other than donuts but oh well. Haha... Each of us got 3 donuts and off we go. It was drizzling and would continue to be so throughout most of the day. It was at this point I realized the car was 4WD and that seems to be the trend of cars throughout Hokkaido.

Our journey today would take us along the northern coastline to Shari and then Utoro which is the hub town for Shiretoko. Shiretoko actually refers to the whole peninsular which includes Utoro. The roads although wet, was pretty much empty of traffic and very straight. No problem there, as the GPS also helped in getting us on the right track. Seriously, a car is worth it if you are planning to visit Shiretoko. We were able to stop rather frequently to take in the sights as and when we liked, though the bleak and wet conditions did damper photo-taking opportunities. As can be seen from the photos basically the scenery of this journey consists initially of the sea and then farmlands and then mountains.


We passed by a tiny railway station, a flower garden which was barren at this time of the year and where we had some hot Hokkaido milk from the touristy shops and then Shari, which was deserted (not surprising for a Sunday morning). It was freezing throughout due to the drizzle and the icy wind.


As we were nearing Utoro, we turned into this area which was gated (but open). There were waterfalls inside and is supposed to be a hunting area? Anyway we saw a fresh leg of a deer on the road. Hmmm... wonder why it wasn't rotting.


We continued on till we reached Oshinkoshin falls, supposedly one of the best waterfalls in Japan. Well it was of course stunning and wasn't too far away from the main road. There was proper parking there and a gift shop as well. We stocked up on coffee. KS had Fire coffee with Hokkaido milk and tasted damn milky. I had this Boss rainbow blend which tasted bland (pun intended). It's called rainbow because it was a blend of 7 different coffee beans.



The town of Utoro, a short distance away, is basically the hub of Shiretoko. It's a really small town which is kinda touristy. There is a hot spring area in the town and its something like 5 mins by car from the town center up the mountain. There's a lot of hotels in that area catering to bus loads of Japanese tourists. Most restaurants there either sold seafood or was closed and in the end we chanced upon a normal restaurant which was catered for tourist buses. We had cheap katsu kare there. Very normal, nothing to shout about.


And after that was the first major fiasco of the trip. As I was reversing the car out of the parking lot I bumped into a signpost. SHIT. The side mirrors was 180 degree out of place. Tried to return it to its original state and whew... it snapped back in place. Then HOLY SHIT. The bottom of the door was dented! Argh... This time kana sai liao. I can see my money flying away already.

Sian... But can't let this incident spoil the holiday la. Might not be coming here for a long time so can't let it spoil the mood. So off we go and headed towards the tip of the peninsular to the famous Shiretoko Go-kan (5 lakes). The lakes are relatively shallow and are in the mountains. Along the way we passed along the visitor center and I bought a Shiretoko hard cover photograph book which at Y3000+ is kinda expensive but the photos were stunning. Along the way we also started to see more and more deer. In fact, we turned into this area which is supposed to be a car park in the summer and saw a whole bunch of deers. But they were afraid of humans though. Didn't manage to get too near.



Finally a while later, we reached the lakes, and boy was the car park packed. We even had to pay to park! Parking is generally free in the rural areas. Seriously the place was packed with old Japanese tourists. All those grandpas and grandmas. The path to walk around the lakes was generally a single file line and you can imagine everyone had to sorta queue to reach the vantage point to snap photos. The first lake was near the edge of the mountain and the second lake was in the forest. Some parts of the path were just stones and soil and so were pretty slippery due to the rain. Unfortunately we could not venture further as the path to the 3,4 and 5 lakes were closed. Probably due to the weather. What a pity...


And it was here that I achieved another goal of my trip. To see real bears in the wild! KS spotted it first. It was right across the lake away from us. It emerged when a group of tourists left that place and we were both the only ones there. Shit... I had to quickly change to my 70-300 lens. At this point I was already lamenting that I did not have the 18-200 lens so that I won't have to keep changing lens between landscapes and wildlife. In any case, even at 300mm, the bear was still rather small. It sauntered along the edge of the lake and then waded into the lake and swam to another part of the lake! Wow...



We then returned to Utoro and to our minshuku (Jap style bed & breakfast) called Minshuku Mariin. Originally I had wanted to book Minshuku Lantan which had a proper website and looked really nice, but apparently they were particular about accepting non-Jap speaking guests. Luckily Mariin took us in, otherwise I would have chosen the hotel right in the middle of the town, which had a hot spring on the top floor overlooking the sea. Not too bad, but we would've missed an opportunity to stay in a minshuku as there wouldn't be any chance later on. This place was run by a friendly chap and his parents.


Haha... got funny incident there. When I was going to take a bath, the owner spoke in Jap and seemed to be telling me not to go into the bathroom. Stumped, I got KS down to try to see what he is saying. He kept gesturing to the clock and we kinda get the idea to go back in 10 mins. Later on I realized it was because he needed 10 mins to fill up the bathtub. -_-" After a damn hot bath, it was dinner time! It was then we realized we were the only ones staying that night. The dinner is traditional Jap style. We took a long time to finish the meal because there was just so much to eat and the hairy crab was very difficult to eat as well (no roe!). After some tea, we retired back to our room and after some attempt to clean my camera lens, I dozed off. I think around 8-9pm. Seriously there's nothing to do at night in the countryside and just as well, I was beat.