I think there is something truly luxurious and sublime about enjoying boredom.
Reclaiming the basic functions of a human being requires nothing complicated. Just enjoy the hot springs and sauna, eat delicious food, and spend the rest of the time doing nothing in particular. That alone is enough to feel wonderful, improve your health, and find happiness. Looking back, that is literally all I did during this four-day, three-night Hokkaido sauna trip.
One of my unofficial themes for this trip was to stay off my smartphone — a journey to reboot myself as a human being, purged of all my digital contamination. Along the way, my battery drained only about 10%. By shutting out my phone and focusing every nerve on the hot spring and sauna experiences right in front of me, I had a real sense that the reboot process was well underway. All that remained was to close out the trip with the ultimate sauna experience at the final destination, completing the startup sequence.
After finishing my sauna session at New Akan Hotel, I walked along the lakeshore for about ten minutes and arrived at Akan Yukyu no Sato Tsuruga. The final stop of a journey tends to bring a bittersweet mix of wistfulness and excitement, and I felt that strange, indescribable sensation — yet strangely, I was not tired at all. Come to think of it, I had already done six sets at Yuyado Daiichi that morning, then two more at New Akan Hotel, bringing me to eight sets for the day. I had no idea how many more I would do here, but it would almost certainly push past ten. Whatever meal came afterward was sure to taste incredible.
After checking in and resting in my room for a while, I could no longer suppress the urge to get to the grand bath, so I set out for an evening sauna session. That day, men were able to use the panoramic grand bath Amanohara on the 8th floor. Walking in after changing, I found a spacious indoor bath, a Finnish sauna, a mist sauna, a cold plunge bath, and a relaxation area — a fully equipped setup in its own right. But climbing the stairs that lead out to the open-air panoramic bath, I was greeted by a breathtaking view that drew an involuntary gasp.
The vast expanse of Lake Akan spread before me alongside the towering peak of Mt. O-Akan, both visible at once. The sky was perfectly clear, and the lake shimmered in a brilliant, crystalline blue. The air was so clean that visibility was flawless — everything looked sharp and vivid. It felt as though I had wandered into some paradise.
I lingered in that other world for a while before returning to reality, slowly lowering myself into the outdoor natural hot spring. The gentle waters of Akan Onsen enveloped my body, which had already worked through eight sauna sets, with a soothing warmth. When my body grew warm, I gazed out at the scenery to rest. When I felt a chill, I slipped back into the hot spring to warm up again. The desire to keep staring at that view set me into an endless loop of alternating between the hot spring and the scenery — but I decided it was finally time to get into the sauna.
On the rooftop of Akan Yukyu no Sato Tsuruga sits the world's first dome-shaped panoramic sauna. It is a sauna room with 360-degree full glass walls made from insulated double-pane glass. Stepping through the door and into the room, I was struck by a strange sensation — an openness I had never experienced in a sauna before. I have visited saunas all across Japan, but I had never experienced one with glass on every surface including the ceiling, offering a full 360-degree view. As a result, walking in brought a rush of excitement that made it genuinely hard to settle down, in the best possible way. The room temperature was around 80°C with low humidity. An iki stove was present, but self-service löyly did not appear to be an option. With the low humidity, the perceived temperature was mild, making it a sauna suited for working up a sweat slowly and steadily over time.
After heating my body sufficiently, I slid into the cold plunge bath in the outdoor section. The water here uses Akan Hyakunen-sui, a celebrated natural water source. It is mineral-rich water from rain and snowfall in the Akan forest, filtered deep underground over many long years. The exhilarating quality of natural water is in a class of its own, and when it carries the distinction of being a prized water source, the sensation is extraordinary. The water temperature was also perfect at around 17°C. From there, I moved on to outdoor rest and took a leisurely break.
It was an enormously pleasant experience, but there is room for improvement, and I want to note it here. A drawback throughout the outdoor bath area in general is that you need to be standing to get a clear view of the scenery. It would be even better if you could enjoy the view while soaking in the hot spring or resting in the outdoor area, but at the moment that is not the case. Specifically, the glass panels of the outdoor bath had not been cleaned, and a buildup of white grime was degrading the view. Because the glass was dirty, the scenery through it looked hazy, leaving no option but to stand up and look out directly — which was a shame. In terms of the outdoor rest area placement, chairs were simply set in whatever open space was available in the corners. If a dedicated deck were set up where guests could sit and take in the panoramic view, the quality of the experience would rise considerably.
For my second set, I returned to the indoor bath and entered the Finnish sauna. To give my conclusion upfront: this was the finest sauna of the two. The 360-degree glass dome sauna outdoors is fun as a kind of attraction, but my personal preference runs toward quiet, dimly lit sauna rooms — and this indoor Finnish sauna was precisely that, hitting my preferences squarely. The design was also beautiful, creating a space that soothes not just the body but the eyes as well. I was also lucky enough to catch the automatic löyly cycle. After working up a thorough sweat, the Akan Hyakunen-sui cold plunge delivered an overwhelming sense of refreshment, and then I moved back outside to rest, cradled in the view of Lake Akan as my second set came to a close.
Afterward, I continued enjoying the hot springs and sauna until mealtime approached, at which point I left the grand bath.
Completely off topic, but that day I had gone a bit overboard with the sauna sessions, and before dinner I began to feel something resembling dehydration. Even after entering the restaurant, my legs were a little unsteady. I eventually drank around two bowls of miso soup and fully recovered — but the sight of someone spending the first twenty minutes of a lavish dinner buffet at Akan Yukyu no Sato Tsuruga, one of Hokkaido's most celebrated dining experiences with an extraordinary variety of dishes, doing nothing but downing bowl after bowl of miso soup must have looked quite peculiar to anyone watching. I really am hopeless.
Once I had recovered, I thoroughly enjoyed the excellent food, returned to my room, and settled in — at which point drowsiness came for me. The weather had been beautiful that day, so the outdoor bath might well have offered a starlit soak right about then, but I had no energy left for that. Sleep won out, and I drifted off into a deep slumber.
The next morning I woke at five and made the most of the other 1st-floor grand bath, Hougaden. The men's and women's baths had swapped from the day before. This 1st-floor grand bath had an entirely different atmosphere: in the garden outdoor bath adjacent to Lake Akan, when you sink into the water your eye level drops to nearly the surface of the lake. Feeling at one with the lake while letting a cool breeze calm your flushed skin is something else entirely. There was also a Finnish sauna in a modern, cave-inspired meditative space, and I spent about an hour from early morning savoring the sauna and hot spring to my heart's content.
Afterward, I had breakfast, checked out, and drove toward Memanbetsu Airport.
Driving across the vast Hokkaido landscape, I looked back on this three-night, four-day journey. A sauna trip that began in Shiretoko and ended at Lake Akan. Days spent without the sound of a smartphone notification hurrying me along, simply feeling the warmth of hot springs, the cold of the plunge bath, and the wind of untouched nature. Without a doubt, I had completed the reboot as a human being.
The end of a trip always carries a tinge of sadness, but at the same time I felt a surge of energy ready to carry me into a new everyday life. I wondered what kind of sauna might be waiting for me next — and with that thought, I walked on toward the boarding gate at Memanbetsu Airport.
