September 21, 2025
Day 19 — Yakumo to Lake Onuma
Marilee here.
Today we achieved an almost perfect balance of backroads and highway riding. We started the day on a hilly little road through dairy farms, and just when our legs were beginning to complain about the climbing, it delivered us back to the highway, where we zoomed along on the flat and really got some mileage in.
It helped that it was both a national holiday (autumn equinox) and that there was a nearby toll highway presumably taking most of the truck traffic. So the highway we were following along the coast was relatively peaceful.
Also, we’d enjoyed a hearty breakfast of eggs and leftover potatoes and chicken, cooked by Tom, so we were feeling very well set up for the morning.
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Our destination for the day was a campground on Lake Onuma, not far from the city of Hakodate, on the slopes of Mt. Komagatake. We debated making a long day of it and pushing all the way to the city, but in the end decided to have one last night of camping in Hokkaido.
And we were glad we did! The ride into the Lake Onuma area was through deep woods, very quiet and peaceful, and the campground is in a beautiful setting at the head of the lake (with no adjacent train tracks —phew!). We’ll miss the beautiful camping here on Hokkaido. From here we are heading to the port city of Hakodate for a couple of days of off-bike city tourism before catching a ferry to the big island of Honshu, to start the next phase of our north-to-south expedition.
Today's ride: 62 km (39 miles)
Total: 988 km (614 miles)
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