What do you know about Nemuro Hokkaido?
I went to Rausu, Shibetsu, and Notsuke Peninsula here is what I learned
I received my second paying Substack subscriber recently even though I am not actively asking for paid subscriptions yet! First, thank you very much. The first email announcing that someone had spent their hard-earned money to subscribe brought tears to my eyes. The second announcement created a sense of urgency within me. That feeling of needing to answer the call to produce some interesting content in return for the vote of confidence! Quite a difference from the advertisement-based social media model that we have all grown accustomed to over the past 10 years. Refreshing, to say the least.
So thank you very much for the kick in the ass and now I guess I can start to get serious about this Substack publishing style!
I will start creating and publishing some videos that will only live on the substack. This is the first. It is another one of my rambling rants while driving in my van, but it is not a Carmentary episode. Those will remain on YouTube. This is a deep dive into my recent trip to the Nemuro area in far eastern Hokkaido.
I explained the reason behind the trip, what I experienced and saw along with some opinions about the future of the area and the opportunities that might be there for investment and business.
The older I get the more interested I become in subjects like population decline, economy, capitalism, tourism, and government subsidies. I spent a good amount of time thinking about Japan which has been my home for 30+ years and what will likely happen in the next 30. Sometimes I am hopeful and filled with excitement for the possibilities and sometimes I find the problems Japan is facing insurmountable and depressing. A visit to far eastern Hokkaido makes both of those visions come to life. I can see all the opportunities and yet the lack of attention and business in the area make it seem impossible…
One more quick note about Hokkaido before we get to my rant. I was reminded again of the sheer size of this island. I flew from Chitose airport to Nemuro/Nakashibetsu rather than drive. The flight time on the plane was about an hour. The drive time would have been about 7 hours maybe more. For some reason, the length of the flight seemed to drive home the fact that Hokkaido is a huge island even more than the long drive would have. Maybe being so high in the sky looking down at the Hidaka mountain range and all the little towns along the way provided a wider overview and allowed me to think clearly about the size more clearly.
One more thing before we get to the videos and photos. I recently reached out on YouTube to ask what people look for in a tourism based promotional video. I wanted to get a feel for peoples ideas and see if they link up with my own. Please comment on that video if you have time. Have is a comment I recieved and I agree with the opinion. Too many tourism related video are simply slow motion bullet point promotion trash with an attractive woman walking through the frame. Well I hope that my substack and other video content fills the need expressed in this nice comment.
I will talk more about the future of the area in part three of this video series, to come in a future post. For now, enjoy the two video rants and the photos attached.
All photos taken with Sony 7R5. Lens used include 70~200mm and 200mm~600mm and 16mm~35mm. The photos seen here are small jpegs straight from the camera with no processing or developing.
Thanks for reading and listening, see you in the next post!