Hakodate

From the 334m summit the city lights fan out below, pinched between the two seas. The ropeway takes a little over 3 minutes, but the queue peaks just before sunset, and on some nights sea fog hides the lights entirely.

A star-shaped Western-style fort completed in 1864, scene of the last stand of the Battle of Hakodate in 1869. The star is invisible from the ground and only shows from the 107m Goryokaku Tower beside it, and cherry trees ring the moat.

Hundreds of seafood stalls and rice-bowl counters packed right outside Hakodate Station. At one corner you hook a live squid from a tank and it is sliced into sashimi on the spot, and stalls open at dawn, with more of them shut once noon has passed.

A row of Meiji-era red brick warehouses on the quay, turned into shops and beer halls. Short cruises leave from the canal between them, and once the brick walls are lit at night they pair easily with the hillside night view on one walk.

A slope that drops straight from the Motomachi hill toward the harbour, with the sea framed head-on where the trees end. At the quay below floats the Mashu Maru, an old Seikan ferry kept as a memorial ship, and in winter the road ices over.

A Russian Orthodox church rebuilt in its present form in 1916, now an Important Cultural Property. Locals nicknamed it the Gangan-dera after the clang of its bells, and on days with services the interior is off limits to visitors.

A blue-and-yellow wooden Western-style hall built in 1910, with an upstairs balcony overlooking the harbour. Inside you can rent Meiji-style dresses and pose in the hall, with the rental charged separately from admission.

Japan's first convent for women, founded by French nuns in 1898. Nuns still live here, so the buildings stay closed, and only the forecourt and a small exhibit room are open. For many visitors the real draw is the shop's madeleines and soft-serve.

A municipal public bath whose iron-heavy water runs dark brown and smells faintly of rust. The Yachigashira streetcar terminus lies a few minutes' walk off, and with locals streaming in and out it feels unlike a tourist spa.

A lake scattered with islets beneath the Komagatake volcano, under 30 minutes from Hakodate by limited express. Footpaths hop between the islands on small bridges, and the cruise boats stop running in winter when the lake freezes.

Begun in 1859 just after the port opened, one of Japan's oldest Catholic churches. The present Gothic building went up in 1924 after a great fire, a weathercock on its spire. Tradition holds that Pope Benedict XV donated the altar.

A glasshouse garden on the shore at Yunokawa Onsen, though visitors mostly come for the monkey enclosure outside. From December into spring Japanese macaques soak and doze in a pool fed with hot spring water, steam rising off their fur.

A rocky headland where Mount Hakodate drops into the Tsugaru Strait; on clear days Aomori's Shimokita Peninsula shows across the water. Poet Ishikawa Takuboku's family grave is on the way, and gusts make a windbreaker welcome on the hottest summer day.

A seaside slope west of Motomachi that began with sailors of Perry's fleet buried in 1854, divided into Russian, British and Chinese plots. The sea opens westward beyond the headstones, so many come at dusk. The tram terminus is a fifteen-minute walk.

An alley of twenty-some tiny stall-style bars and eateries a short stroll from Hakodate Station, opened in 2005. Each seats around ten, so you drink shoulder to shoulder with strangers, and hopping between two or three is the norm.

A white consulate with blue window frames, built in 1913 and now a museum of the port's opening. Roses fill the inner garden, and a ground-floor tea room serves an afternoon tea set of scones and black tea overlooking it.

A 618m active volcano steaming on the coast at Hakodate's eastern tip, roughly sixty minutes' drive out. In late May and June the park at its foot turns pink as its huge azalea colony flowers; from the mid-slope car park, walk up past the fumaroles.

Seat of the Matsumae domain at Hokkaido's southwest tip; its keep, Japan's northernmost, was rebuilt in 1961. Some ten thousand cherry trees of many kinds flower in succession through the last days of April and the first half of May. Allow two hours by car.

Japan's first Trappist monastery for men, founded in 1896 in Hokuto west of Hakodate, known for its long approach lined with cedars and poplars. Only men who apply in advance may enter, and the shop out front sells the monks' butter and cookies.