Sapporo, Japan

I'm on what I hope will continue to be an annual trip to Japan. 2023 was the first year that I was back to Japan since 2018. Between some health issues and the COVID pandemic, I was not able to come here for quite some time. This was really disappointing given that for about 15 years I went to Japan on nearly an annual basis. From 2015 to today, I have only been here four times. I'm hoping that I won't experience another absence like this again.

For the first leg of the trip I was in Narita, Yokohama, Toyama, Gunma, Niigata, and Tokyo. During the last leg of this trip I am back to what is perhaps my favourite place in Japan: Sapporo. I absolutely love this city. In particular I love the summer weather here. It is far cooler than on the main island of Honshu. When I was in Tokyo and Toyama last week the daytime highs were hitting 37C at times with very high humidity. This was almost unbearable. I really didn't want to walk around and do any sightseeing of any kind. To do so simply resulted in, at worst, heat stroke or, at best, returning home as a sticky, sweaty mess. This isn't the case in Sapporo given that it is far enough north to have a slightly cooler climate. Daytime highs here have been around 26C.

There was one downside yesterday: it rained like hell all day! But, this created an opportunity for me to discover another part of Sapporo - the underground city that has been built connecting all of the main parts, including the hotel that I'm staying in. This is an ingenious piece of infrastructure, especially during the winter months when it can get relatively snowy and cold in Sapporo. This underground city must be a wonderful place to be in the winter.

I'm continuing to try and explore some things in Sapporo like the underground city that I didn't see last year. One thing that I wanted to see last year was the Buddha on the Hill. Unfortunately I didn't have enough courage to try and make my way out to this site and so I decided to pass. This year I decided to do it no matter what. Today was the day and it was quite the site to see. Despite all of the tourists that were there, it is a very peaceful place. It was nice to just sit and meditate for a while. 

Getting to the Buddha on the Hill was a bit of a trip. I had to take a train and a bus to get there but it was well worth it. While waiting for the return bus I had a nice chat with a tourist from Korea. This older lady had impeccable English skills so it was really easy to chat. All of this made of a very pleasant afternoon.