{"id":108270,"date":"2025-03-06T10:03:20","date_gmt":"2025-03-06T01:03:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/voyapon.com\/?p=108270"},"modified":"2025-04-11T14:10:42","modified_gmt":"2025-04-11T05:10:42","slug":"hokkaido-fat-bike-tours-snowball-fights","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/voyapon.com\/hokkaido-fat-bike-tours-snowball-fights\/","title":{"rendered":"Hokkaido Fat Bike Tours and Snowball Fights"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The sight of the snow brings me sadness. As I strap into my snowshoes and walk up the closed mountain road, my eyes catch bushels of sasa<\/em>, an evergreen bamboo, piercing the windswept crust. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hokkaido sits high among the pantheon of Earth\u2019s wintery paradises, but warming in the region brings volatility to the island\u2019s powdery saga. High atop Mount Mokoto, above the crystal blue of Lake Kussharo, flecks of green tinted yellow among white tell the story of the world-changing.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI am glad I will not be young in a future without wilderness,\u201d American writer and philosopher, Aldo Leopold, once wrote. Today, I fear seeing a Hokkaido where sasa grows deep into January.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

My companions and I trudge slowly on the sides of a closed winter road toward the trailhead. We follow along the tracks of previous hikers relying on their wisdom, perhaps blindly, to find our way as winds kick up swirls of frost. Today\u2019s hike is not long, three hours roundtrip, nor is it steep, only rising a meager 300 meters into the cloudy skies.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Despite this, the trek is mythic, following along an ancient scar where a mountain similar in size to Mount Fuji once stood. 30,000 years ago primordial wars beneath the earth raged and reclaimed that rising mountain back into its depths. Man was young then, without common cause, searching for its station across that cataclysmic landscape. Nowadays, they walk among the sasa, eager to protect this land from themselves. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

We rise on the snow, climbing higher into the sky, pushing poles into the hardpack for stability as we duck below icebound trees.<\/strong> The clouds obscure the vision of the lake, but at our backs, if only for a moment, we are permitted to witness the Shiretoko peninsula stretch out next to the calm blue sea.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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After some effort, we arrive at heights. On our left, the cliff drops into grey nothingness. Our right is flanked by trees frozen and covered in snow. To our head, obscured in clouds, a stranger walks towards us. The wind blows hard but the echo of a bell rings softly. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The stranger approaches. I recognize him as a friend; he greets us eagerly and in English, informing us that we are getting close to the summit. \u201cPast the grey rocks, climb the rope, then 15 more minutes.\u201d Smiling frozen faces give final goodbyes and we continue. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

At last, we arrive at the rocks, a jagged outcropping dividing the rim of the trail. A reminder of the violence of the earth, silent across the ages. A short technical section sees us climb through this disfigurement. The trail then slopes again, remains straight for some distance, then rises again with the summit hidden somewhere in the void. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fat Bike Tour on the Okhotsk Sea<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Jewels of ice cover the beaches of Tokoro, pushed high onto the shores by the foamy waves of the Okhotsk. They glint and shimmer under the rays of winter sun, diamonds amidst driftwood and long-forgotten scraps of fishing gear, long forgotten. Waves bring more of these with each wallop against concrete tetrapods. A precursor to the infamous drift ice which in a short time will cover the seas in a blanket of white.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The drift ice, a product of fresh water spilling into the sea in the far north, marches in slowly subject to winds and waves. Today, the seas are clear, and the drift ice\u2019s arrival is delayed by stubborn heat and angry swells. <\/p>\n\n\n\n