On April 6th, my former coworker / friend took me on a day-trip drive along the West coast along the Shakotan peninsula. It’s less “Shakotan” Diaries since we actually didn’t spend too much time in Shakotan itself (there really isn’t much else in Shakotan considering it’s a village with a dwindling population), and more “Shiribeshi” (the subprefecture I live in) Diaries, since we ended up passing through quite a few towns in the area.
I woke up bright and early, because my friend was going to pick me up at 8am. We stopped at a Lawson for potential drinks and a toilet break, passed through Tomari, a village mainly known for their nuclear powerplant (and thus, is pretty rich), and made our first stop in Kamoenai Village at a sweets shop, Inabaya. According to my friend, they freshly make their manju among other sweets. I did have breakfast before I left, but I can’t pass up eating freshly made goods. Plus, the manju was small. She also treated me to their donuts, but I had those the next day.
The miso manju was super soft, a bit warm, with a fluffy outside, and smooth red bean paste filling. The donuts came with a packet of sugar, but after taste testing a bite of one, I realized these also had a smoothe red bean paste filling on the inside, along with a clearly fried, but still fluffy and cakey thick outer layer. As expected of a Japanese sweets shop. Since there was enough flavor already, I didn’t need the extra sugar sprinkled on top.
We stopped by the Kamoenai Roadside Station, Osukoi, for a bathroom break, and also to see what goods they were selling. It was a cute roadside station, with a few refreshment options, and some tables selling cute handmade goods and trinkets. What caught my eye was that they were selling sakura soft serve, and I knew I couldn’t pass up the opportunity.
In case you’re wondering, Kamoenai’s mascot is a dragon.
The soft serve was less soft, and more of a frozen yogurt icey-ish texture. It had a stiffness to it, yet melt-in-your-mouth feel. As for the flavor, it was also less sakura, and more sakura bean paste, reminiscent of the scoop I had recently in a Nana’s parfait. There was a creaminess from the bean paste flavor, and still some sakura flavor to it. Overall, though not what I expected, it was very interesting.
Without any more pit stops, we made our way to Cape Kamui, a supposedly famous cape in Shakotan. It was super windy, to the point that if you don’t consciously exert effort the wind could actually knock you over, especially the higher up we climbed on the hill, but the views here were absolutely amazing. It wasn’t too much of a hike, and not too many people either. Apparently, in peak summer season, they open up the Nyonin-Kinsei gate midway through the path, and people can go all the way down the trail to the observatories to see Kamui Rock and the lighthouse when it’s less dangerous, but the day we went it was closed.
We stopped by my friend’s friend’s house after, and then headed for the Shimamui coast to see another cape, De Cape. This one also seems fairly popular, as there were signs everywhere in English, Chinese, and Korean. First we went through this tiny, low tunnel that led to the observation deck. View here was not as high up, but also had pretty waters and beautiful nonetheless.
After coming back out from the tunnel, there’s a paved sloped road with the promenade entrance to the right that leads you up to the De Cape Lighthouse, also a much higher view. That was a pretty steep slope, and continued on for quite a bit. My butt was sore, and it was certainly a hike up.
At the top it was a bit windy, but not nearly as much as Cape Kamui. The lighthouse was a bit small, but otherwise except for tall grass, all that was visible was literally just the sealine, with ocean as far as you can see. The paved road ends there, and according to the signboard at the bottom of the hill, and supposedly there’s a path that you can follow all across the coastline on the mountain to the Kasadomari Observatory, Jyorouko Rock, another observatory, and then back down. The only path I saw up there though was a very narrow, almost not path-like path, and my friend said there are actually bears up there, so we weren’t taking chances going all the way.
We stopped by another friend’s house, and headed over to the neighboring town Bikuni to grab lunch at a place my friend recommended, Jun’s Seafood Restaurant. It’s a cozy little place, with big portions. Because it was a seafood place and every town along the coast is a fishing town, I went with the sashimi teishoku at my friend’s treat. Despite it being a seafood place, my friend got their zangi teishoku, as she said their zangi is special in the area because it’s huge. It was indeed huge and she gave me one, and though I’ve seen some big zangi, this one definitely tops the list.
Everything was very yum, and it came with a ton of food! Miso soup was comforting, and I’m a huge sucker for Japanese simmered vegetables. The chawanmushi was a bit unusual, but I enjoyed it nonetheless, silky, smooth, and just a bit sweet. For the sashimi, the set came with tuna, scallops, salmon, octopus, sweet shrimp, and mackerel. Though only 2 pieces of each, everything was very high quality-tasting, and though salmon and scallop are my favorite, I have to give a shoutout to the tuna which didn’t look too fatty, but absolutely melted in my mouth, and the sweet shrimp. The zangi was also very good, and very huge.
After lunch, we drove over to Furubira, a neighboring town, and despite being in Furubira, stopped by the East Shakotan Fishing Association where you can directly buy goods. There was quite a bit of various seafood and seafood products on sale (including shrimp ice cream???), for not bad prices.
We passed through Yoichi, known for being the home of Nikka Whiskey Distillery, and into Niki to check out Niki Shrine. Each town in Japan has a shrine, but I recently learned that Niki’s has quite a few unusual wine-themed decorations, as it’s known for well, producing wine. All the wine stuff at the shrine are newer though, because they’ve been donated to the shrine over the years by the Distillery and Wine Association.
After briefly driving up the hill behind town to check out Niki Hills Wine Distillery, which usually offers tours and tastings in the summer months, as well as wine in the restaurant year-round. Neither of us really drink alcohol, so we took a look at the offerings and left.
Our last stop at Niki was at Fruits Factory, a local bakery that my friend claims has the best cakes in the area. There were a ton of things that looked good, but I’m only one person, so I opted for the apple pie using local apples (Yoichi is known in the area for their apples).
I put it in my fish grill (such is the no toaster life) when I got home, and only the top was toasted, but it was a pretty nice apple pie. Apples inside were nice and soft, and there might have been a bit of custard inside.
Our last stop of the day was at Mushroom Kingdom, which functionally serves as a roadside station to use the bathroom, get a quick meal, and buy souvenirs. Yes, they have an emphasis on their mushroom goods, including various mushroom dashi and teas, but they have most of the standard Hokkaido ones too.
They had this really tempting cherry ice cream (Niki is known in the area for cherries), but I was still not too hungry, so I suppose the cherry soft serve will be for another day if I can somehow find my way there again…and we headed home.
It was a very fun day seeing all these spots, and I’m very thankful I had the opportunity to go to a lot of these places that are only accessible by car. The weather was also super nice that day!
It’s a thing in my town too, but I learned that Japan really loves to name all of the rivers and tunnels in the area, no matter how big or small.
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