If I start talking about “this line in this season” or “XX station on this line is a famous place”, there is no end to it, and such stories are better written in specialized magazines such as “Tabi to Railroad” (Travel and Railroad).
What I appreciate about being born and raised in Japan is that there are four distinct seasons and a wide variety of climates in different regions. Even in the same place, the scenery changes as the seasons change, and even in the same season, what you see differs from place to place.
A sense of the season as seen from the train window
When it comes to feeling the seasons, the first thing that comes to mind is the train window.
It was about 30 years ago when I took the Kushiro to Abashiri train for the first time on the Kushiro to Kushiro main line in Hokkaido. The sun had set by the time the train passed Shari, and I remember well how the train was filled with excitement when the track went along the coast and the sea covered with drift ice appeared in the windows of the train.
This is also a reflection of the fact that all the passengers were thrilled to see the sea filled with ice floes. However, if I start to go into that, I will not go into the details, because I was one of them.
In recent years, there have been many occasions when travelers on the Kushiro Main Line have gone to see drift ice but have come up empty. If possible, it would be better to schedule your trip according to the drift ice conditions, but the difficult thing about drift ice is that it can change overnight depending on the direction of the wind.
As one would expect, there are only a limited number of train routes where one can see drift ice from the train windows, but snowy landscapes such as snowfields and snow-covered mountains are common in northern Japan. It is not easy to live there, but the scenery from the train windows certainly makes one feel as if one is in a snow country. However, sometimes there is a blizzard, or the train is rolling up a plume of snow, which turns the outside of the window completely white.
On the other hand, summer is all about the sea. There are many train lines running along the coast all over Japan. However, not all of them can be called “seasonal words for summer,” since there are so many different types of coasts. For a “seasonal word for summer,” it would be safer to look for coastal scenery in the tropics, such as Shikoku and Kyushu.
Autumn is the season when the leaves change color, as the weather forecast is always accompanied by “news of the changing of the leaves. While the autumn foliage can be enjoyed all over Japan, it is only possible on routes that run through mountainous areas.
Personally, I would like to visit the Ishikatsu Line in Hokkaido during the autumn foliage season, but have not been able to do so. There is even a signal station named “Kaede” (which used to be a passenger station). I have not been able to visit the Ishikacho line in Hokkaido.
One of the difficulties with autumn foliage is that there is a limited “good” period. The most difficult condition is to take a train that runs during the daytime when the leaves are at their peak, on a line that passes through the area, and under clear skies. No matter how beautiful the autumn foliage may be, you cannot see anything if you take the train at night, and it does not look good in the rain.
Then, it would be safer and more reliable to make a schedule of train connections ahead of time, and then decide when to launch the plan and make arrangements while watching the autumn leaves move south.
© Source travel watch