Showa Shinzan

Most mountains are unimaginably old. Showa Shinzan is not. Between 1943 and 1945, in the middle of a flat wheat field near Lake Toya, the ground bulged, cracked, and heaved upward into a steaming red dome of lava — and people stood there and watched it happen.

Why It’s Interesting

It is, in effect, Japan’s newest mountain, still warm and faintly smoking decades later, its rock baked a rusty red. The story is as good as the geology: with wartime authorities suppressing news of the eruption, the local postmaster, Masao Mimatsu, meticulously recorded the dome’s daily growth from his window — measurements scientists still use. He later bought the land to protect it. You can’t climb it (it’s protected and hot), but you can stand at its foot, watch it steam, and ride the nearby ropeway for the bigger picture.

Best Time to Visit

Year-round. The contrast of the red dome and its white steam against winter snow is especially dramatic.

Getting There

It shares a base area with the Usuzan ropeway near Lake Toya, reachable by bus from Toya Station or, more easily, by car on a Lake Toya loop.