Ofune Site and Irie Site

Waypoint introductions and full write-ups

1. 1. Ofune Site

   Ofune is a Jomon settlement on the southern tip of Hokkaido, in the hills above Hakodate, and it is a lot bigger than the signboards make it look. The Jomon were hunter-gatherers who lived in the northern forests of Japan for something like ten thousand years, long before rice farming, and they built a settled life around chestnuts, fish, deer and the odd well-travelled trade good. Ofune was inhabited for centuries and is now part of the Jomon Prehistoric Sites in Northern Japan, which UNESCO recognised in 2021. Reconstructed pit houses hold the grass in place, and the scale of the pits tells you someone intended to stay.

   Read the complete Ofune Site write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Ofune Site is where the day begins. Next is Kitakogane Site.

2. 2. Kitakogane Site

   Hokkaido does not usually come to mind when people talk about ancient Japan, yet the shell heaps around Uchiura Bay are some of the oldest signs of settled life in the archipelago. Kitakogane sits on the edge of the bay near Date, roughly halfway between Muroran and the volcanic country around Lake Toya. The Jomon people who lived here gathered shellfish, hunted deer and fished, and they threw the shells onto the same pile for centuries, which is why a modern visitor can read a kitchen midden like a diary. It belongs to the group of northern Jomon sites that UNESCO listed in 2021.

   Read the complete Kitakogane Site write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Kitakogane Site comes up about 170 km into the recorded legs. Next is Irie Site.

3. 3. Irie Site

   Hokkaido's southern coast sits on the edge of Funka Bay, a large, nearly circular inlet of the Pacific that is well sheltered, and about ten kilometres from the town of Date there is a shell mound that records how people lived here some four thousand years ago. Irie is one of the sites that make up the Jōmon Prehistoric Sites of Northern Japan, which UNESCO listed in 2021, a group of settlements and ritual places left by hunter-gatherer-fishers who lived without agriculture but built permanent villages, and who made the remarkable coiled-cord pottery that gives the era its name. The mound consists of discarded shells, fish bones and other debris, along with graves, and it is a rich archive of daily life.

   Read the complete Irie Site write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   about 192 km into the recorded legs you reach Irie Site. Next is back through Kitakogane Site.

4. 4. back through Kitakogane Site

   Return visit. Read the place description above.

   Read the complete Kitakogane Site write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   back through Kitakogane Site, late in the day. Next is Ofune Site.

5. 5. Ofune Site

   Return visit. Read the place description above.

   Read the complete Ofune Site write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Back at Ofune Site. That is the ride.