Finally, on our last day in Hokkaido we zero in on the city of Kushiro, but before that we visit the Akan International Crane Centre in the city's north for another look (hopefully) at those gorgeous red-crowned cranes, known locally as tancho. This is a place devoted to the cranes and performs the dual roles of nurturing the endangered birds as well as providing a great opportunity for visitors to observe them in the wild. There are interpretive displays, a video to watch, and a bird hospital outside. The publically chosen nickname for the centre is Grus which is part of the scientific name for the cranes.
Tancho may be rare, but photographers are in abundance in the well-structured viewing area. There are 25 or so cranes coming or going. It's quite windy (not to mention a long way below zero), and the tancho are quite spectacular as they exploit the wind to take off and land. There are dozens of whooper swans there too, which, sadly, get in the way of clean photographs. But the cranes were close enough to get some good snaps.
The Akan International Crane Centre main building.
Photographers are well catered for at Grus.
In flight, in search of a better spot.
A crane amongst the swans.
Running into the wind for takeoff.
Strong headwind makes landing easy.
That's my crown!
Red-crowned crane in profile.
Whooper swans like it here too!
Kushiro is a large port city (4th in Hokkaido) which was opened to trade with the UK and USA in 1899AD and benefits from being relatively ice-free compared to others this far north. We have a quick lunch at the Kushiro Washo Market (Mike and Steve pig out on sashimi) and then we asked the critical question: "is there a Starbucks in Kushiro?". We haven't had a cappucino or espresso since leaving Sapporo, so the need was great. The answer was yes, just opened! Steve had a big fat mocha, we had our usual.
On sale at the Washo Market in Kushiro.
It's best to eat your fresh seafood right at the market, like we did.
The market came to a stop when Japanese darling and (eventual) gold medallist Yuzuru Hanyu was on the ice.
Red-crowned cranes on the Route 113 bridge across the Shinkushiro River, just opposite Starbucks.
And then to the airport for a JAL flight to Tokyo Haneda. So, what did we think of Hokkaido? In summary, it was not what we expected. Once we left Sapporo with Steve and headed east, we really thought we were headed into relative wilderness which would be sparsely populated, and very few visitors. How wrong we were! Cities and towns were much bigger than we thought. Almost everywhere we went was crowded, and packed with tourists, and most of them were not Japanese, and not westerners either. The sights were beautiful, there's no doubt, but we didn't expect such numbers to be looking at them with us, bus tours everywhere. The Meiji Restoration had the objective of developing the island and keeping the Russians out - they seemed to have achieved the former, but maybe not the latter.
This photo density map shows our coverage of Hokkaido, with a distinct focus on the east.
We know (and met) Aussies who have successfully toured Hokkaido on their own, renting a car, but we employed a private local guide, Steve, from Hokkaido Nature Tours (HNT), who took us everwhere and arranged everything. This was successful for us - we could never have seen the sights so efficiently without a Steve. Because it was a private tour, Steve was very accomodating of our expressed wishes, and also, he flexed the program wisely to cope with forecast bad weather, of which we had a fair bit. Thanks Steve, and thanks HNT.
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