Mount Moiwa – Sapporo – a must do on a cloudless, warm night

Mount Moiwa in Sapporo offers some of the best sights of the cityscape at night time. It’s a fantastic, nearby mountain just off from the main city centre with a well done ropeway and is easy to access. The ropeway entrance can be almost reached by the street car (trams) or bus with an additional shuttle bus or plain walking. On arrival at the Ropeway Entrance street car stop, you can either catch the free shuttle bus which comes every 15 minutes or walk the sloppy hills for 10 minutes to the entrance of the Ropeway.

Sapporo’s street car (tram) system is limited to a circular line that touches places like Susukino and Tanukikoji. At certain stops, you can see an interactive map showing the location of the street car and how far it is away from your stop. There are modern street cars, coloured in black, and ordinary street cars, coloured in green. The difference in the street cars is whether they are capable of letting people in wheelchairs access them at ground level, otherwise there are steps you have to use on the ordinary ones.

The price of the street car is 200 yen for each adult and it is paid when you leave the tram either with your IC card or coin.

Getting from Susukino to the Ropeway Entrance stop took around 25 minutes. On arrival, we walked to the free shuttle bus stop which is 2 minutes walk around the corner. It was a very popular option as there were many older people and families. The shuttle bus doesn’t have much room for people, maybe room for around 20 people. (If you are young and able, I recommend just walking the distance, which is 10 minutes, to the ropeway entrance building. There are just very steep slopes to walk up, but shouldn’t be too difficult.)

Once in the building, you have to use their sole elevator to get the ticket counter floor. Tickets are 2,100 yen per adult and children are free up if they are 12 or under. The ropeway experience consists of two rides, one that takes you to the middle station which doesn’t have much to offer) and another that takes you to the summit. The first is about 5 minutes and the second is one minute long. Just don’t dawdle or you’ll miss your transit, otherwise you will have to wait another 15 to 20 minutes.

The ropeway is a nice experience. Just be sure to get the best positions to see the climb. The first ropeway offers great views, whereas the second ropeway doesn’t offer much in the way of views.

At the summit of Mount Moiwa is a building with three different floors. The first floor is for the entrance and exit, the second floor has a takeout cafe and restaurant, and the top floor is the summit.

Be warned, the top floor is open air and when I was up there it was so cold! I could barely keep myself warm on an evening in May.

Make sure to get the money shot and it may take some patience

When we first got to the summit, we barely saw anything because the clouds were masking the city lights. But as the night went on, the clouds moved and we were able to see the spender of the whole cityscape. It’s quite a beautiful sight.

There is a bell that can be rang on the summit. (You probably don’t want to say up there too long.)

You can bring your own food and drinks if you want.

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