If you're awake at 5AM and it is a little too early for breakfast, why not considering a morning onsen session?

In the evening, you can completely relax in their open air spa with some illuminations and cooling winds, but in the morning, the scenery from the indoor bath is also wonderful!

Every single view screamed 'BEAUTIFUL!'

Of course, you can't take photos inside an onsen but please feel free to feast your eyes on the beautiful views in the morning.

At 6.40AM, I had my breakfast in the hotel and proceeded with check out.

Lake view from my room

This is a very common question that I always receive, even from my parents.

At about 9 in the morning, we've arrived Lake Mashu and holy moly, the view was AMAZING!

After being amazed at Lake Mashu's beautiful views while also slightly saddened that I will remain single (jk), our road trip continues to Mt. Io. 

Mt. Io is a sulfuric mountain. Lots of steam coming out from the ground.

If you noticed the yellow thingy, yes, those are the sulfur. They smell like egg yolks to me.

Besides being famous for the sulfur smell (?) from the volcanic vent, this place is famed for their eggs!

Iozan (or Mt. Io/ Mt. Iou) is actually an active volcano!

You can also consider to walk in their walking trails (longest one is just about half an hour's walk, probably within 3km) that you can go to Kawayu Onsen.

There is a shop near the parking lot that you can buy onsen tamago (onsen eggs) and they taste good.

The eggs are cooked by their heat!

Mt. Io's autumn leaves near the parking lot

After our visit, it's almost lunch time. 

We stopped by Michi no Eki Shiretoko for lunch.

The lunch was simple, but it tastes good. 

Here, they serve deer meat too. It might sound like a turn-off, but this is the local culture.

In Japan, they have the saying of 'itadakimasu', which directly translates to 'I humbly receive'.

Before meals, we say 'itadakimasu', where this word contains the feelings of gratitude to the animals for their lives, the farmers/ fishermen that harvested/ caught the meal, the chef that prepared the meal, the waitress/waiter that served us the meal... basically to everyone that have contributed their power for this meal to be brought to us. 

After the meal, we say 'gochisousamadeshita', which is generally translated to 'thanks for the meal'. 

This is actually also a line to appreciate all of the efforts of the people that brought this meal to us.

The Japanese showed their respects to the lives of animals that they consume. Despite the meat not being something that we commonly eat, we respected the local culture and appreciated the food served to us.

Shiretoko

However, the weather got so cold and windy that on Shiretoko Pass, it was a whopping 0.8 degree Celsius!! 

As such, we were unable to continue our cycling tour. So, we went downhill via the tour operator's van... And the funny thing happened - the seat broke at one corner that we had to reverse our seats and get out from the van via the boot. It's almost like we were prisoners, lol!

Before we end our journey on the road on the mountains of Shiretoko, we stopped at a stopping point and man, the view is AMAZING.

It was windy. I regret not wearing thicker. Literally jumping around when I got off the van and started wearing masks. 

After that, we continued our journey to Shiretoko Goko (Shiretoko Five Lakes).

Another shot of Shiretoko First Lake

And so, we arrived!!

My solo photo looked horrid. I'm sorry.

Another lower angle shot of the Road to Heaven

If you're tall legit need to look for new ways to take photos lol

And after that, we proceeded to checking in our hotel in Shiretoko Daiichi Hotel!

We chose there for their greatest dinner buffet.

The reason we chose Shiretoko Daiichi Hotel is that, they have the best dinner buffet of over 100 types of food selection, and it has a yatai style of space!

There are Japanese, Western, Chinese food. I personally am impressed that they made blue curry and called them "Drift Ice Curry". As a Malaysian that is particular with curry this is actually pretty tasty (and refreshing) despite the color.

Also, we enjoyed the onsen very much and had a great time as a group! ^^

After our buffet, we shopped a little in the souvenir stores. This is my greatest find so far. 

It's pretty funny, I'd say!

Anyways that's basically the full day for me.

I'll update more again in the next post!

Until next time ^^