It is my opinion that paying for a gym membership, no matter where you live in the world, is one of the worst wastes of money imaginable. Here in Japan is no different. In the last year I have utilized my own surroundings, and incorporated some simple exercises that have helped to shed 25 kilos. […]
Autumn has really settled in here in Sapporo. I’ve been eyeing up my snowshoes. First snows could be only a few weeks away. More likely around Christmas time, but one can always hope. In the meantime, we are stuck with consistent rain and temperatures hovering around 5 Celsius. In the early morning. If we do […]
March 2003, eating a hot dog from a vendor near my hotel in Kiev, Ukraine. Lots of cabbage on top, kinda like coleslaw. Not my proudest world culinary moment. I hardly remember any of the food eaten on that Trans-Siberian trip, but that hot doggy thing under a streetlight at dusk still sticks. I remember […]
With only four primary brewers battling it out for supremacy amongst Japanese consumers, and a micobrew scene that remains straight jacketed by anachronistic laws, Japanese marketing has to really pull out all stops to distinguish themselves on the supermarket shelf. Kirin decided to really turn on the Hokkaido charm by featuring the winding Chitose River, […]
Each evening I walk the dog around 9 o’clock. It’s a bitterly cold walk in the winter. There are few interesting sites to see along the way. But recently this phone booth caught my eye. I love how the snow cocoons itself around the glass. Sometimes, if the snow has recently fallen, the door is […]
A few weeks back we had a bit of an Indian winter in the midst of a rather balmy March. It allowed me to strap on my Tubbs Wilderness snowshoes one last time to frolic in the environs of Asahiyama Park. The snow was fresh, the wind was strong, and the backcountry was mostly untouched. […]
For the past three winters I’ve felt that the mountains of Hokkaido were a no-go. Snow and ice made impassible trails that were downright dangerous to even attempt. My wife was even under the misguided belief that the mountain trails were “closed”, i.e. it was illegal to even go there. As preposterous as that sounds, […]
Winter is now fully here, no turning back this time. Pretty much a constant accumulation of snow, low temperatures, shoveling, and most importantly – snowshoeing, until at least mid March. This past week I’ve gotten to fully field test my Tubbs Wilderness snowshoes as well, as all my other trekking gear, in Asahiyama Park. Asahiyama, […]
It’s been awhile. Not that I haven’t been writing, reading, sketching, and exploring my new town of Sapporo. Now that I am back in the swing to some degree, and I have a routine of sorts in place, I feel it is important to reveal one element of that routine – public parks. Usually, here […]
Although Sapporo is a relatively symmetrical city, laid out in mathematical blocks like an igo board and rather flat despite being surrounded by mountains, there are some architectural anomalies that have caught my eye since moving here. They aren’t the famous spots like the Tokeidai or the Former Hokkaido Government Office, both well maintained western […]