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| Rishiri Island |
It was quite a trek to get there, we flew from Hanada to Wakkanai, then took a bus from the airport to the ferry terminal. And then a 2 hour ferry over to Rebun where we were picked up by the hotel shuttle.
Rebun is the older of the two islands and has some incredible hikes and views. It is known for it's unique alpine flowers, many of which can only be found on this island. Due to the strong westerly winds and sea air the plants and flowers have evolved over time.
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| Alpine flowers on Rebun Island |
It's interesting that on western side of the island there are virtually no trees, there is no way to drive down the western coast and all the vegetation is very low to the ground. In the winter the winds blow all the snow over to the east so that is where you find the trees as they live to have the blanket of snow over winter.
We hired a guide, who happened to be the same guide for both islands, she is bilingual and great, we learned so much from her and she had a car so she could drive us around the islands. This is an important thing to note. Getting around the islands is hard, very few buses, rental cars have to be booked ahead of time as they are bought over from the mainland and taxi's are few and far between.
Hiring a guide not only gave us insider knowledge but also a way to get around. Our first day we headed to the south of the island in the morning for some hiking and flower viewing.
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| The Cat Rock on Rebun Island |
Our guide also told us we were having exceptional weather, that the islands are usually very windy, we just had a pleasant sea breeze! It was still quite hot and ended up covered up because of the horseflies, long pants are recommended as there is poison ivy all over the place too and some of the paths, although well maintained, are quite narrow.
Rebun has several hike routes available so the guide can adjust your trip to your levels. She did say that one of the hikes advertised on the company she works for says the longest hike is 8 hours, but it is a hard hike and rarely is it done in that time frame, so keep that in mind if you are booking something.
Another advantage of having a guide is them knowing where to go to eat. Neither island has an abundance of eateries, on Rebun we went to a place fun by the fisherman's association, you can't just walk in, you need to book. If you are a fish lover, you will be in heaven but your wallet will be crying! Both hubby and son love fish, I don't eat it at all. Their meals were ¥6000 each compared to my chicken bowl which was ¥1300.
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| Lunch from Kaisendokoro Kafuka |
We all got excited to see seals basking on the rocks. I recommend bringing binoculars with you, and you are more likely to have seal sightings in the cooler months, we just got lucky. There are also sea lions that visit and are caught as a meat source. Thee are no farms on the island and so the majority of food is imported from the mainland, making it expensive. Ebi-kun tried the sea lion bacon, is tasted way too fishy for my liking. But if you know Ebi-kun, he will try anything once!
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| Sea Lion Meat and Basking Seal |
The hotel... I think the idea behind this hotel is a romantic European vibe. Being European, it gave off grandma vibes, way too many teddybears and dusty fake flower arrangements for my liking. The meals were set with 2 times to choose from to eat. I asked for a non fish meals but I managed to get one fishy dish in every meal. That aside, the food was good, the guys enjoyed copious amounts of fishy stuff.
They put on a drone show, not actually with drones, a video shown on a big screen of a drone flying over the island, as after dinner entertainment. And on our second night they weirdly stopped everyone mid meal to tell us there was a lovely sunset, so we could leave and watch it if we liked. Most of the people piled out and headed to the back of the hotel which has views over the sea. And a number of staff offered to take photos of the guests. Then we all returned to our meals. Weird!
We did get to see meteor showers at night and apparently you can see the Northern Lights in the colder months.
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| View from the cape |
There was a small store a few minutes walk from the hotel but the opening times are not like the big city! Everyone we met was really kind and friendly which is a refreshing change after the hustle and bustle of Tokyo. It was much more laid back and slower paced,
If you are a stay up late, lay in, in the mornings kinda person, this is not the place for you. Both islands the breakfasts are served early, in Rebun the choice was 7.00am or 7.30am and dinner was at 6.00pm And everything closes early. Which forced us to take things easy and unwind.
Out of the two islands, Rebun was my favourite, it felt kind of European with the alpine flowers and scenery, you could almost be in Switzerland in some areas and Ireland in others. Plus you can't beat the view of the volcano of Rishiri across the way!
INFO
If you want to see the reviews of all the places we visited on the island, I'm a Local Guide on Google and you can see my reviews here.
Our guide is from Hokkaido Guide Service and her instagram is here.
