Hokkaido in summer is a land of lavender fields, fresh produce-fuelled fine dining and wildlife you won’t see anywhere else in Japan.
Most visitors know Hokkaido for its snow, but locals eagerly anticipate the months after the thaw. Long days mean farm-to-table dining under clear skies, hot springs without the winter chill, and the freedom to hike or cycle without the crowds. There’s still that classic Japanese ambience (miso ramen at midnight, wine from Yoichi, ice cream churned just metres from the paddock), but the island feels relaxed and easier to savour. Discover the best things to do outside of snow season with this Hokkaido summer guide.
Food and wine
Sit down to Hokkaido’s famous Genghis Khan barbecue. (Image: Getty/ Okimo)
In Hokkaido, summer is officially harvest time for sweet corn, melons and cherries. And seafood markets brim with scallops, sea urchin and crabs pulled from the icy currents surrounding the island.
No trip here is complete without Genghis Khan barbecue, a succulent lamb dish grilled over domed plates and paired with seasonal veggies. If sushi is more your pace, Otaru Sushiya Dori packs countless restaurants into one stretch, each serving plates that double as works of art.
And then there’s wine. At Camel Farm Winery in Yoichi, the cool climate nurtures vines that produce crisp whites and berry-rich reds, further proof that Japan’s northern frontier provides healthy competition to some of the world’s best wine regions.
Roughly half of Japan’s raw milk comes from Hokkaido and is considered famously rich, finding its way into cheeses, pastries and the kind of soft-serve ice cream you’ll have dreams about. Pull into a roadside stand for a cone, and you might see the herd that supplied it grazing in the paddock next door.
Nightlife
Dive into Sapporo’s Susukino district nightlife. (Image: Getty/ Winhorse)
As dusk settles, Hokkaido trades wildflowers for wild nights on the town (within reason). Sapporo’s Susukino district hums with more than 3500 bars, izakaya and shopping establishments ranging from hole-in-the-wall ramen joints to sleek cocktail lounges. The best way to dive in is on a Susukino Night Walking Tour, where guides usher you down narrow laneways and into miniature worlds you’d never stumble across on your own.
For a quieter affair, take the ropeway up Mount Moiwa and watch the city twinkle beneath you, save for the dark patches reserved for neighbouring mountains. Or, wander through the Jozankei Nature Luminarie, where forest trails glow with illuminated sculptures and lanterns, creating a dreamlike nocturnal landscape to float through.
Nature
Explore Japan’s wildflowers.
Daisetsuzan National Park is the crème de la crème for hikers. Trails weave between alpine meadows, while Mount Asahi’s peak follows you wherever you go. In summer, the park becomes a natural flower garden with more than 250 species blooming across its ridges.
Cyclists can head south to Biei and Furano, where the patchwork fields roll on endlessly and lavender season turns the valleys into a sea of purple, perfuming the air like nature’s scented candle. Even if you’re not one for cycling, a frolic through the fields could very well be the most whimsical moment of your adult life.
Aquaphiles aren’t left out, either. Lake Shikotsu is so clear it’s arguably Japan’s most transparent lake, while Lake Tōya hides tiny volcanic islands at its centre. Paddle quietly and you might spot sea eagles swooping low or dolphins majestically breaching high.
Back onshore, Hokkaido is the exclusive home to Japan’s Usuri brown bears, but the animals are notoriously shy, so most travellers only see paw prints.
Also discover Shiretoko Peninsula – a UNESCO World Heritage site – is one of Japan’s last true wildernesses. Waterfalls plunge straight into the sea, lush trails appear endless and quiet inlets provide a moment’s peace from the real world.
Wellness
Noboribetsu Onsen’s mineral pools are said to cure everything. (Image: Getty/ Spuyan)
If there’s one thing Hokkaido takes seriously, it’s bathing. Hot springs (or onsen) bubble up across the island, offering the perfect end to long days outdoors.
Noboribetsu Onsen is often considered to be the most famous of the bunch, and its mineral pools are said to cure everything from fatigue to arthritis. At Tokachigawa Onsen, rare plant-based minerals soften the skin, while Yunokawa Onsen offers outdoor baths that overlook the Tsugaru Strait. Even in the heart of Sapporo, you can retreat to Jozankei Onsen, where forested hills cradle open-air pools.
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Culture
Discover the culture of Hokkaido’s Indigenous people. (Image: HATA)
The word ‘Hokkaido’ itself only came into use in the 19th century. Before that, the island was widely known as ‘Ezo’, a name closely tied to the Ainu – Hokkaido’s Indigenous people.
In Nibutani, you’ll encounter the living culture of the Ainu, an Indigenous group from northern Japan. Museums and craft centres here share stories through textiles, carvings and performances, keeping traditions alive while welcoming curious visitors. It’s a chance to see the island not just as a landscape but as a homeland.
Summer in Hokkaido is a destination in its own right; rich in nature, flavour and well-preserved Japanese traditions. Although most travellers flock to Hokkaido for its renowned slopes, few people know what this island’s capable of when the sun works its magic.
After youth-led protests in 2025, this year Nepal elected a 35-year-old former rapper as Prime Minister. In a country where tourism is its biggest industry, what’s next for travellers?
In 1986, Nepal changed its clock. It had used India Standard Time since 1920 so, to differentiate, it wound its clock 15 minutes ahead of, not behind, its big-brother neighbour. Boss move. “Nepal is strongly opposed to the idea that our identity is connected to India,” says Community Homestay Network (CHN) guide Bikal Khanal.
Tharu dance is traditionally set to hand drums. (Credit: Kate Lewis)
Today, Nepal is the only independent country with a 45-minute deviation to universal time; an oddity that’s become a symbol of national pride. The quirk is nearly as endearing as Kathmandu’s Tribhuvan airport where carved varnished wood and shiny red bricks rule. One sign points to a ‘Travelator’ and another to a ‘Grievance Handling Desk’ while visas are noisily stamped at customs for US dollars, cash only. When am I?
Spot the endemic Nepal gray langur. (Credit: Simon Urwin)
The 15 or 45 minute anomaly sees me tap out completely on timezone calculations. Why bend my brain calculating if it’s quarter to or quarter past elsewhere when I’m in the honking here and now of Kathmandu where the air is high-altitude crisp, the prayer flags flutter and the street dogs howl?
How tourism is changing in Nepal
Bardiya National Park is rich with wildlife. (Credit: Simon Urwin)
India is not the only association many Nepalis would like to shake. With eight of the world’s 10 tallest mountains, including Mount Everest and Annapurna, Nepal has long attracted mountaineers and trekkers, and expedition numbers are continuing to rise.
Tourism is one of the country’s biggest sources of foreign currency, so this growth is not negative, per se. But according to Ang Tshering Lama, who co-founded Phaplu Mountain Bike Club, being reduced to a mere trekking destination is limiting.
“Trekking is just one layer of our identity,” says Ang. “When it becomes the dominant narrative, it limits how we’re seen and how we see ourselves.” Nepal’s recent success, however, in diverting trekkers to less-trafficked areas such as Manaslu mofuntain, where visitor numbers rose by 117 per cent last year, offers hope that tourism can diversify even more radically.
Local men in Bhada village. (Credit: Simon Urwin)
The founder of CHN, Shiva Dhakal, wants that change. “The whole idea of the Community Homestay Network is to promote experiences outside of trekking,” he says. “Community tourism changes lives and helps kids stay home instead of coming to the city or migrating to the Middle East.”
Ang grew up seeing people leave, “not because they wanted to but because there weren’t enough opportunities to stay”, he states. Yet from remote villages to living traditions; food, art, music and emerging subcultures, “there’s so much that’s not being seen.”
CHN is opening some of those doors. It doesn’t own, or fund, any homes. Rather, it promotes homestays to travellers on a single, slick platform, while fostering entrepreneurship in places where women, marginalised castes, Indigenous people and the youth stand to benefit the most.
A new generation demanding more
Dalla Town Hall, where volunteers discuss anti-poaching tactics. (Credit: Bheem Thapa)
The future prospects of next-gen Nepalis can no longer be ignored. On a Kathmandu tour with 33-year-old guide Monica K.C, we pass buildings torched in the September 2025 ‘Gen Z protests’, including the Supreme Court and Parliament House. Seventy-two people died. “They were anti-corruption protests,” says Monica. “Politicians’ children are living a lavish life but the airports are crowded with youngsters leaving to find work.”
We stop in ‘little Tibet’ at the wondrous sixth-century Boudha Stupa. “The wheel of life is Buddhism in a nutshell,” says Monica. “Things such as hate, ignorance and anger keep you rotating around the wheel, so you must follow the principles of Buddhism to detach. If you can’t, there’s no nirvana for you.”
Boudha Stupa’s prayer wheels are used to recite Buddhist prayers. (Credit: Kate Lewis)
In a sun-drenched twist to the usual temple visit, we ascend the stupa’s sloping plinth and roam its whitewashed dome. Tendrils of diaphanous prayer flags stream from a steeple-like structure where the Buddha’s unblinking eyes stare out. No nirvana for you…
Tibetan-style prayer flags embellish the whitewashed dome of Bouda Stupa, a Buddhist temple. (Credit: Kate Hennessy)
The dome is delightfully free of guard rails or chiding from security. There is, however, a stern ‘No TikTok’ sign, perhaps in response to the youth’s newly flexed power. The booted-out Prime Minister, K.P. Sharma Oli, was replaced in a resounding election victory in March by 35-year-old Balendra Shah of the Rastriya Swatantra Party (RSP) – a former rapper and mayor of Kathmandu. The RSP’s manifesto indicates tourism is a priority, and that Nepal’s cultural identity in areas such as gastronomy will be strengthened.
Vibrant souvenir shops and cafes around Boudha Stupa. (Credit: Kate Hennessy)
A more confronting stop awaits at Pashupatinath Temple. Today is Bala Chaturdashi, a Hindu festival where thousands of devotees gather to honour their dead ancestors. Vendors hauling foam mattresses do a lucrative trade as people set up for a night of vigil. This includes burning the bodies of recently deceased relatives on bamboo pyres in the Bagmati River, which flows into the sacred Ganges.
A woman at annual Hindu festival Bala Chaturdashi, in Kathmandu. (Credit: Kate Hennessy)
Wrapped in a shroud, the bodies are positioned with their heads facing north to the Himalayas where Lord Shiva resides. They’re covered with flowers and straw and set alight by male family members.
Hours later, the ashes are swept into the river where devotees will take a holy dip the next day. As much as Monica assures us it’s not voyeuristic to watch, I struggle to do so. “Here you see the reality of life because everyone ends up there,” she says, gesturing to the river.
Life unfiltered in the Terai region
Tharu woman and master weaver Parbati Chaudhary in Bhada Village. (Credit: Bheem Thapa)
The reality of life needs processing time, which the western Terai region delivers in spades. The Terai is largely separated from India by the Karnali River and Bardiya National Park, where elephants, rhinos and the elusive Bengal tiger roam.
Once a nomadic tribe, the Indigenous Tharu people are now the largest ethnic group here. “They didn’t know their daily life was interesting for international travellers but they’re starting to understand now,” says CHN founder Shiva.
Take a Jeep safari through Bardiya National Park. (Credit: Bheem Thapa)
We fly Buddha Air to Dhangadhi airport and drive five hours to stay in Tharu homes. The journey to Bhada village is a blur of roadside fruit stalls, traffic-stopping sacred cows and fields sown with wheat, rice, mustard, spinach, cauliflower and potatoes. Nepal’s agriculture feeds only Nepal.
Marigolds are an important part of Hindu rituals. (Credit: Simon Urwin)
“The only thing we export is young people,” says our guide Bikal. As the light dims and we plunge evermore rural, mysterious mounds of compacted hay – some house-sized – loom like the creatures from Where The Wild Things Are. Even our trusty driver gets flummoxed by a dirt road that abruptly ends and we find ourselves hurtling across a paddock.
On arrival, some are ferried to mud-walled cottages greened by gourd creepers, with thatched roofs and rustic-chic mosquito nets. Myself and two others are ushered to the home of corner store owner, mechanic and mushroom farmer Man Kumar Chilaruwa and his wife Rajkumari.
A warm welcome at a community homestay. (Credit: Simon Urwin)
They escort us to a bunker-esque back building with steel doors and a folding security gate, behind which is gleaming linoleum, dolphin-printed tiles and a shower cavity that must be gingerly stepped through to reach the toilet.
The ceiling lights emit a rainbow of colours (the bathroom light gets stuck in, frankly, a quite frightening red). We’re nevertheless touched that our hosts invested in all this bling when the average salary is around $275 a month.
In the coming days, we participate in Tharu traditions such as making moonshine, dancing, weaving straw handicrafts and gold-panning. We’re fed well with staples of rice, mustard greens, lentil pancakes, daal, curried chicken and tomato chutney served on antibacterial saal leaves.
Dig in. (Credit: Kate Hennessy)
Sonara community homestay president Indradevi Tharu tells us river snails are often served, and the boiled and pickled flesh of rats hunted in the rice fields. “Perhaps next time?” we say and all have a laugh.
The power of community homestays
Barda community homestay owners Parbati Chaudhary and Ram Krishni Devi Chaudhary. (Credit: Simon Urwin)
Immersing Western visitors in foreign cultural practices is not new. But with the Tharu, I never get that uneasy sensation that I’m being performed for. Despite being the only tourists, there’s no ‘othering’; just warm, composed and ultra-dignified welcomes. Like we’ve always been here.
“I love to have travellers in my village so I can see the world,” says local woman Parbati Chaudhary. “Why would I travel the world when the world comes to me?”
The graceful acceptance the Tharu offer, as well as the slow pace, works miracles on my frazzled nervous system. One day I even take a nap on a vacant homestay bed.
An authentic stay in the Sonara community. (Credit: Kate Hennessy)
Roosters strut and goats bray as we sit on the ground in al fresco kitchens, rolling rice flour into cylinders steamed to make dhikri (dumplings). When water is needed, we fetch it using a hand-operated pump as a family of ducks strolls by, side-eying us like curious neighbours.
Animal lovers will delight in Tharu villages. Kind and resourceful inventions are everywhere, such as snacking stations where two posts lean together, with leafy boughs dangling on rope for baby goats to forage from.
CHN’s CEO, Aayusha Prasain, nods knowingly when one in our group says she cried when she left her host, Shayam Chaudhary, in Bhada. Shayam’s 17-year-old son, Prashant, had translated, which deepened the connection.
“Community tourism turns travel into a relationship, not a transaction,” says Aayusha. “It places decision-making power in the hands of local communities, especially women and youth.” Since 2018, CHN has hosted more than 4000 travellers from 52 countries in 408 households, and estimates women’s participation has increased by 381 per cent.
Elephant watch. (Credit: Simon Urwin)
In the Bardiya community, where vexing human-animal conflict has been a balancing act for decades due to elephants raiding crops, long-time homestay operator Salik Ram Chaudhary says young people keep the older ones on their toes.
Gathering greens. (Credit: Bheem Thapa)
“We can’t keep homestays stagnant,” he says. “We have to upgrade our service and redefine our product or young people won’t see it as an attractive business. If we can keep evolving with this travelling trend we’re confident the youths will stay and continue it.”
Back in Kathmandu, Monica explains that after the deaths of young protestors in September, a determination had spread to not let their sacrifice be in vain. “We want to keep holding the government accountable,” she says. “We don’t know what situation we’re facing, but we’re ready to face it.”
Interested in Nepal but prefer to experience it in total comfort? Read our guide to luxury travel in Nepal.
Hokkaido summer guide: nature, gastronmy, nightlife and more
