By Simon Rowe

NOT so long ago, I walked out into a cool Hokkaido night stark naked.

It is not something I make a habit of doing on my travels - at least not without a few coins for a hot coffee - but I just happened to be in the mountainside village of Asarigawa on Japan's Hokkaido island, where travellers have good reason to wander around in the buff.

Scenic views add to the pleasure of outdoor hot spring bathing

A handful of hot spring resorts, or onsen, dot the gentle slopes, and their outside rock baths, called rotemburo, stay open year-round to comfort the foot-sore and the boneweary.

Having missed my bus connection back to Sapporo and having walked down a winding rural road to an onsen called Hotel Korakuen, or Big Paradise Hotel, I now stood on the rim of its rotemburo with a serviette-sized courtesy towel to fend off the evening chill.

From there, it was just a matter of passing through a veil of steam and into the bubbling mineral waters of an expansive rock bath, where, to my surprise I was the only customer on that evening. Now, that really was
paradise.

Hot spring bathing remains a sacred pastime in Japan, whatever the season.

The pressure-cooker lifestyles of Honshu's urban dwellers couldn't be further from Hokkaido's rolling
farmlands, sleepy villages and national parks, where more than 200 onsen bubble, ooze and spout across
three active volcanic mountain groups.

Their mineral-laden waters are still used by local inhabitants to cure ailments like rheumatism, arthritis and hypertension.

Travellers staying over in Sapporo can take advantage of the numerous onsen which lie within the nearby Shikotsu-Toya National Park region. Most of these are easily reachable from Sapporo Station or New Chitose International Airport by public transport.

The hot spring resorts of Toya, Shikotsu, Noboribetsu and Jozankei usually top the list with their tranquil
river settings, mirror-clear lakes and active volcanoes with steaming caldera, which provide the most pleasing
vistas for a good wallow.

River trail

Jozankei Onsen is the most convenient, reachable by a one-hour Jotetsu bus service from Sapporo Station. A dozen onsen cluster along its Toyohira River, offering outdoor bathing.

Staying a night in one of the town's atmospheric ryokan, or traditional inns, or modern luxury hotels is also a possibility for travellers not too pressed for time.

Jonzankei's hot springs are just one diversion. Scenic walking trails criss-cross the surrounding area and follow the tea-coloured Toyohira River, passing by camping sites and golf courses that attract hikers and canoeists during the summer months from June to August.

The thermally heated spring water at Hell's Valley is pumped daily to fill the hotel baths in Noboribetsu

Hell's Valley

Noboribetsu Onsen, which lies two hours by bus, or 90 minutes by train from Sapporo, is just as popular.

It also features the added attraction of Jigokudani or Hell's Valley - a fume-belching moonscape of thermal activity created in the aftermath of, thankfully, a none-toorecent volcanic eruption.

From beneath the town, more than 10,000 tonnes of thermally heated spring water are pumped up daily to feed its many hotel baths.

Consuming the lion's share of this is likely to be the Dai-ichi Takimotokan Hotel, which boasts 30 kinds of baths, including rotemburo, Scandinavian-style sauna, rocket-strength spa baths and the icy reviving waterfalls, not to mention a large main bathing pool that looks out onto the ominously steaming Jigokudani.

It really is Hokkaido's ultimate water world experience.

Active volcanoes

Requiring more travelling time to reach is the Akan National Park area, where the hot spring town of Akan Kohan offers the added excitement of bathing beneath active volcanoes.

With an abundance of rotemburo and the chance to slip into yukata (cotton kimono for men and women) after a sumptuous meal at one of the nearby village inns, more than a few visitors consider it well worth the six-hour train and bus journey from Sapporo.

Sleeping giants

Thumb through the postcard racks in any Hokkaido onsen kiosk, and a snap shot of Toya-ko, or Lake Toya, is sure to be among them.

Three hours by bus south of Sapporo, numerous onsen perch on its volcanic sand shores and the smoking cones of Mount Usu and Mount Showa Shinzan, mirrored perfectly in the tepid blue water, reminding bathers that they are in the presence of sleeping giants.

The only grumbling you are likely to hear in Hakodate - a hardworking port town across Uchiura Bay and farther south of Toya-ko - is that of street cars grinding their way along ancient streets.

Jump aboard one of these ageing steel people movers for the 30-minute ride out to Hokkaido's longest running hot spring resort town, Yunokawa Onsen, and you can reward yourself with a soak in its sulphur-rich outdoor tubs.

Expansive luxury resort hotels and traditional wooden ryokan vie for customers along the meandering Matsukawa River that cuts a mighty swathe through the township on its way to the Straits of Tsugaru.

On warm summer nights, the horizon shimmers with hundreds of isaribi fishing boats as they trawl these straits with huge tungsten lamps in search of succulent squid, which inevitably end up on the sashimi platters of hotel guests.

Photos by JNTO

This article was first published in The Straits Times by the Special Projects Unit, Marketing Division, SPH on September 16, 2008.