Sapporo Beer Museum & Hokkaido University, Sapporo, Hokkaido, Japan

February, 2013

Closing my series of Sapporo related posts with two places I suggest to include on your city tour- Sapporo Beer Museum and Hokkaido University.

For a moment, let’s forget about the Clock Tower or Snow Festival and admit somehow that the first thing that comes to our mind when we hear the word Sapporo is beer.

True enough, Hokkaido is considered as the birthplace of beer in Japan, attributing to the regions climate and rich soil producing high qaulity hops. Even the distinct neon brights night advertisement of competing brands at Susukino somehow attest to how the beer company is very well alive and accepted as part of Hokkaido’s main industry.

Considered as one of Japan’s oldest and premier brewery company, Sapporo Breweries was established at Sapporo in 1876. These days, within the same land of the brewery facility is the Sapporo Beer Museum where enthusiast can learn more about the history, see the changes on its bottle design, admire the pin-up girls and sample the varieties of beer.

Located north of Sapporo Station is Hokkaido University. Considered as one of Japan’s top university and research facility, it was established under the same year as the Sapporo Brewery (1876). The university previous name is Sapporo Agricultural Collage headed by William S. Clark, the man depicted at the statue at Hitsujigaoka Obsrvation Hill with the caption “Boys be Ambitious!” underneath.

Universities are fun to explore though we often put it on the bottom of our list and will only enter if we don’t have anything else to do , but for the case of Hokkaido University I will strongly recommend to put a walk in the campus as a must do activity.

The reason is quite simple and almost the same as what I have repeatedly mentioned on my previous post about Hokkaido in general- fresh air and nature.The campus greenery is overwhelming beautiful, sometimes it feels more like I was walking inside a park instead of a school. How fortunate Hokkaido University students are!