It was another last-minute weekend mission. It followed all the usual patterns. Wednesday, messages started getting sent around.
“Any plans for the weekend?”
“Not sure, depends on the weather,” would be the reply.
Then Thursday comes around. From Sapporo, we’ve got access to a number of coasts, all facing different directions. So begins looking at the weather, divining what coast might have the best conditions.
“Shakotan could be a goer,” the messages read.
Then Friday morning. “How about we try an overnighter around Yoichi?”
And so birthed the plan for this early autumn weekend paddle.
We left Sapporo on the Saturday morning early, so we could get to Yoichi, drop the kayaks and gear, drive the van to the take out 21km west along the coast, and catch the bus back to the put in.
I ended up being the one to drop the van off at Bikuni and take the bus back. In the end, however, I managed to get to Bikuni just after the one bus for the hour departed from the bus stop near the Bikuni beach. I called the team and we decided that it was worth not waiting an hour for the next bus, and get a taxi instead. Splitting the 6000yen between the four of us made it worth the extra cost to save an hour or more of paddling time.
We pushed off the beach at 10:40am.
It was dead calm. We covered the 3km or so to Shiripa-misaki in no time.
Rounding the cape, we were immediately thrust into a different world. Gone were concrete breakwaters and old abandoned roads. We were now surrounded by rock, cliffs, and caves.
Beyond Shiripa-misaki was cape after cape after cape. Tall conglomerate cliffs. Secluded gravel beaches. All sheltered, all dead calm.
We could also see the day’s main prize in the distance – the iconic Candle Rock. Everyone who knows about Shakotan Peninsula knows about Candle Rock. Today, the conditions looked like they would allow us access.
But along the way, first, another cave. This one deeper than the first.
We’d paddled part of this coastline to Ebisu Rock previously, but on that day there was a very decent swell running. We weren’t able to confidently access Candle Rock. Today we were heading straight for it.
The base of Candle Rock was more island-like than I’d envisioned. We paddled around the outside of the island, before tucking into the rocky reef on the inside. Took the obligatory photos. And then carried on. A tick-it-off-the-list sort of experience.
With the main event now over, next on the list was to find a suitable spot to camp for the night. We’d Google-scouted a couple of possible locations, but on the ground, the beach was either too small or too steep or too rocky.
Soon we came to the old abandoned Route 229 relics. Old highways now cut off from the rest of the world. Tunnels concreted shut. We figured we might be able to camp on the old road. We tried one bay, but access to the road was going to be difficult – we’d need to climb up a 2m-high concrete embankment. Timbah gallantly took a look, but even with his height, it was a scramble.
The next bay along the coast, however, had a flight of stairs up to the road. There was also a flat spot in the coarse rocky beach, perfect for a campfire.
We were set.
And then we noticed a statue near the tunnel entrance (the entrance is now concreted over). This made me recall that there was some sort of traffic disaster along this stretch of coast. We had a very weak cellular signal, so I looked it up.
Sure enough, along this coast somewhere there’d been a tunnel cave-in, killing 20 people.
“Wow, that’s tragic,” I said. The others nodded in agreement.
I wondered where exactly this had happened. Upon looking at photos online, and watching some drone footage of others who had done their own macabre disaster sightseeing, I came to a somewhat unsettling realization.
The tunnel entrance where we’d pitched out tents not 20m away from, was the very tunnel entrance that had collapsed, crushing a tourist bus, killing all 20 occupants. It took officials two weeks to get to the wreckage.
It was just going on dusk when we made this grisly realization.
“That is so spooky,” said Saoka.
Indeed, the realization cast a somewhat spooky pall over the night’s campfire.
Despite the fact we were camped so close the site of a disaster, I slept well. The sun rose warm against the cliffs for the final 10km or so to Bikuni.
We would spend those 10km paddling from cape to cape, punctuated by concrete, old decaying abandoned roads, and small settlements on the coast.
It was obviously the season for salmon fishing – the Furubira River mouth was teeming with fishers. Dead salmon who had not made it to the river floated lifeless and moldy on the surface of the water.
After rounding Attoma-misaki, the last cape before Bikuni, Haidee decided to practice some rolling.
“I’m so hot in my drysuit,” she complained.
We arrived into Bikuni at just after 11am. The beach was alive with fishers and campers. We were glad we’d made the effort to make this an overnight trip. It was one of the last kayaking trips of our season for 2022. Not long after, the Sea of Japan switched to winter mode – strong northwesterlies, making the likelihood of a calm paddling day much less.
