Lux Japan: City #2 Sapporo

If you look at a map of Japan you can see that it is shaped like a dragon. Sapporo is a city on the northerly Island called Hakaido, the head of the dragon. After one of the easiest and most relaxing travel days I’ve ever had I realized how stressful flying in the US (and in most of the world) has become. Sapporo is around the same longitude as Canada so we were rightly prepared for some cold.

We had another mountain to climb for the Sapporo shot and luckily there is a serious slope just on the southwest edge of the city that offers the perfect sweeping view of a sprawling and brilliantly bright city. From our hotel we took the subway, to a bus, to the Ropeway (Gondola), that would take us up to the top. The ride up was gorgeous, as the sun had sunk below the horizon creating a pink backdrop behind the accumulating luminance of city lights. At the top once through an impressive souvenir shop (which we heavily patronized) and up a spiral staircase is a roof deck complete with speakers blasting cheesy soothing positive tunes to accentuate the view. I set up the camera in a far dark corner where few would frequent and let the shot run. The temperature had drastically dropped and Gayle and I, after about 20 mins and seriously frozen toes took turns going inside to warm up. After 40 mins my numb self accidentally tripped and gently bumped the camera. AAAARG! I stopped the shot in order to keep a ghost image from forming and stuck in another film holder. This meant another hour of the frozen roof deck. I really don’t think I have ever been as cold in my life even in Minnesota (only later to find that somehow in my jetlagged state I had not loaded the 2nd shot’s film holder. I spent the rest of the trip praying that the first shot was long enough!!) Post 2nd hour we warmed up at the mountain-top restaurant and ate our first western style meal along with a my favorite beer, Sapporo of course,looking over the city before heading down again to find our hotel and crash. Gayle is a frozen on top a mountain trooper!