Shakotan Blue, Nikka Whisky and Otaru: Full-Day Hokkaido Coast Escape in Sapporo

The coast west of Sapporo has the best scenery within a day's reach of the city, and this ten-hour trip works its way along it. The first stop is the Nikka Whisky Yoichi Distillery, where you have three quarters of an hour to explore at your own pace among the stone buildings and kilns of the place that started Japanese whisky. From Yoichi the road climbs onto the Shakotan Peninsula and out to Cape Kamui, where a walking trail runs along a narrow headland to a point with roughly three hundred degrees of open sea around you. The water below is the reason people come: the Shakotan Blue is a genuinely unusual colour, and an hour and a half here gives you time to walk the cape properly rather than glance at it from the car park. Lunch follows back in Yoichi, and the afternoon includes seasonal fruit picking, which is what this fertile stretch of coast is known for outside the whisky. The last stop is Mt. Tengu above Otaru, where just over an hour gives you the panoramic view across the harbour and the bay, particularly good as the light drops. Two starting points and two drop-off points are available so you can join and leave the tour where it suits you. Travel is by coach with self-guided time at each stop, which keeps the day relaxed rather than regimented.