Day 1

After a few months since arriving in Japan, we finally decided to go on a short field trip to Shikotsu Toya National Park which our main goal is to cover and explore the main attraction of Shikotsu Toya national park as much as we can. Starting off our journey, we gathered at the nearest Convenient store which is Seico mart. For those who don’t know yet, you can only find Seico Mart in Hokkaido, crazy right?! After getting breakfast and buying necessary stuff such as snacks. Of course, fellas, if you don’t have any snacks for a car trip that is going to feel like days.

After arriving at our first checkpoint which is Toya Lake, you would give the same reaction as me and my friends. The lake is super clean and clear during the day and as a bonus you could see Mount Usu, I could not name another perfect spot for camping and picnic during that time. 

After enjoying the view of Shikotsu Toya lake which takes us around an hour because the view is super nice, and you could see how beautiful the lake is with our face in the picture!  

Sadly even though we try our best to save time on lunch to get to our next destination we could not make it because of few factor (road closure which increased our route duration, weather, energy level dropped) which due to weather condition it could be very dangerous for hiking and our member energy level also sims not fit enough to continue. So, our director (Vanessa) and co-director (Yi wei) had decided to change our first day objective due to time, weather and energy constraints or maybe they also very tired because had to take care 7 adult with childish like personality hahaha 

Next stop is Jigokudani (Hell Valley) in Noboribetsu !! and before that of course LUNCH! We had our lunch at DAIOU Curry Ramen Noboribetsu Onsen Shop. When we enter the restaurant, I can instantly tell that the restaurant is very famous because we could see a lot of reviews from food reviewers, pictures and signatures were stuck on the wall.

So, both of us spent almost one hour with a starving stomach looking at them. One thing about Jigokudani, we were visited by the Oni(demon) not once but twice!  After that we both had our lunch at the nearest Seico mart to get our proper lunch. But don’t underestimate Japan convenience store, which I can say Seico Mart provide the best fried chicken in whole Hokkaido *just from my opinion and my friend Khew hehehe… 

After regaining our energy, we continue our journey to the hell valley. Which gives a hell like aura. As the valley is an orange to red colour, smoke comes out from the surface and most importantly it smells of very strong Sulphur. To those who wonder what Sulphur smells like?? Smells like rotten egg. I had to endure the smell for almost two hours, no wonder it was called “hell” hahahaha. Before we leave, we enjoyed foot onsen which I can say to be honest… not so special since the water is not as hot as we imagine... yaa i will rate “so-so” for the leg onsen hehe :p  

After that we headed to our accommodation which is at a community centre beside Toya Lake. We bring our own sleeping equipment such as a small pillow and sleeping bag. Well, you also can sleep on the floor since it is made from traditional Japanese style tatami and the temperature is around 8 to 12 degrees Celsius and if you are still considering sleeping on the floor and don’t want to bring a heat tech sleeping bag or cover, be my guest :)…. 

Before dinner some of us went to the nearest public onsen available. After the whole day trip, the onsen really helped me to lessen my body fatigue. I would give 10/10 for onsen!!  After that we bought our dinner (bento) at Seico mart. Since it was past 8PM most of the restaurants were already closed and we had our dinner by the seashore. Sadly, we missed the fireworks (hanabi) due to some of us enjoying the onsen so much and forgot to be home on time. After that we went back to our accommodation to get proper sleep and rest. SEE YOU ON DAY 2!!

Day 2

It's Day 2!! And our first stop is the - Volcano Science Museum. I thought it was going to be another boring museum until I experienced it myself. We were introduced to a short video of the history of volcanic events that have been happening around Shikotsu Toya National Park for the past century. No wonder the population here is quite low because imagine living in an area where there is a high possibility of a volcanic disaster that could happen anytime. Nope i just live in Sapporo or any place that doesn't have such a possibility haha. :p . Anyway, the video was SUPERFUN. The content is normal but ITS IN 4D EFFECT?! Seriously, I did not expect it to be in 4D cinematic effect. I'm not bluffing guys, check it out yourself!   After that even though it was raining, we still went outside to see the damaged buildings, which were being preserved as information material about what the buildings and roads would look like after an earthquake and volcanic event. Not only that, but we also went on the pathway surrounding the museum, which I can say takes around 1-2 hours to complete with climbing and descending a small hill, taking a few risky pathways which, we only completed halfway because it was too risky in such slippery conditions to continue. However, our director did buy us ice cream in return to make us feel better hehe!.  

After that we continued our journey to the next stop to the ropeway Mount Usu. We paid a few thousand yen to access the ropeway, or you can try to climb for free. After taking the ropeway we stopped at a small cafe where we could buy sweets such as ice cream, coffee and hot chocolate. We continued to the first observation deck which we could see NOTHING (maybe for a few seconds we could see the shape of the Mount Usu) due to the dangerous pathway where it was very foggy, windy and rainy, you name it! After that we decided to turn back and not proceed to the next few observation decks because there was no point in continuing in such weather. 

We managed to refresh ourselves with an early dinner at Bikkuri Donkey which I can say is a pretty decent place for having dinner with good service and the interior was sooo nice with the mixture of Japanese and Western design.  After dinner we went back to our accommodation and straight to the onsen! Because after a whole day of journey onsen is the best place to ease your body fatigue. Around 8:30PM we gathered, hundreds of fireworks exploding over Lake Toya which I can say is a perfect way of ending our journey of our first National Park trip in Japan. 

Day 3

As I thought yesterday was the end of our journey, suddenly our third day destination before going home was headed to the famous Cape Kamui ?! Since it was an unfortunate journey in the national park because of the bad weather conditions. My friend (Khew) and Vanessa decided to spend our last day trip to Cape Kamui, where the weather was in perfect condition at the time. When we arrived, it was sunny and very windy. Just to let you guys know that you better bring a windproof jacket and put on sunscreen, or you will get sunburned like me :(.  

THAT'S ALL FOR THREE-DAY JOURNEY GUYS!! SEE YA ON THE NEXT TRIP BYE BYEEEEEE