Japan Trip 2023: Mt. Moiwa and Sapporo by Night

Something that I wanted to do on this trip is to go up the tramway on Mt. Moiwa to get a nighttime look at the lights of Sapporo. I've improved my photography skills a lot since I was last here in 2007. At that time, my wife and I went up Mt. Moiwa at night to take in the sights and have supper. I took a few pictures but, without a tripod and the knowledge to take low light photos, what I got was less than stellar. I really wanted to give this another try. I was also planning on having supper at the summit once again.

Navigating Sapporo is a bit more challenging than Tokyo. Don't get me wrong - public transit here is still excellent but it is more piece-meal than in the larger cities. Heading out to Mt. Moiwa was laid out for me on Google Maps and it looked pretty straight-forward: two subway rides to the tramway and then up the mountain. I had to make a train change at Susukino Station and this is where I learned that navigating Sapporo is a bit different. Upon going to the ticket machine, I couldn't make sense of the subway map. I was supposed to get on another line called Sapporo Shiden. But, there was no listing for such a line. I walked up and down the station. I walked into an attached mall but couldn't find any sign of this other subway line. I finally came to my senses and looked it up... Sapporo Shiden is a street car system. Ugh... I should have known.

After figuring out the street car system, I made my way to the base of Mt. Moiwa. From the street car drop off, it was a short and steep walk up to the tram station. I earned my exercise points on this walk. The tramway is done in two stages. The first stage is a tram similar to the one in Jasper National Park back in Canada. The second stage is a "ropeway" with two smaller trams that are pulled up a track to the summit station. Both trams were full on the way up and on the way down. This is definitely a popular tourist spot in the evening. When I got to the top I could see why.

Although I'm just using the camera on my smartphone, it has enough manual features that I was able to adjust the appeture, ISO, and white balance just enough to take some decent nighttime shots. It was well worth the effort to come up here at night. It was an adventure and what I was able to capture absolutely made my day.