Key sources, concepts and delimitations

In terms of primary sources, this paper mainly relies on the travel book Kounryusui (j. 行雲流水 – e. floating with the tide) by a member of Otani’s travel team, Uehara Yoshitaro (1870–1945). The book was published in 1940 and contains Uehara’s travel stories and poetry from his extensive travels over many decades. The publisher, Yukosha (有光社), had published some of Otani’s books and seems to have had a connection to the Honganji organisation. The chapter about the Arctic, called “Hokkyokuyu” (j. 北極遊 – e. travels to the Arctic), is largely based on a personal travel diary written by Uehara during the Arctic cruise in 1900. Approximately 22 pages of the book cover the Arctic cruise, which took place from 3 July to 2 August. The writing focuses on the various land excursions and only rarely describes conditions and activities on board the ship. It is important to mention that this paper, while based on Uehara’s text, focuses on Otani Kozui. This is intentional. The approach builds on the assumption that Uehara, Hori and Honda were working for Otani, who was the undisputable leader of the group. It is consistent with the established practice for the Otani expeditions, which are all named after Otani, even the ones that he could not join in person. This is logical as Otani was the main initiator, organiser and sponsor of the expeditions.

Uehara’s text is informative but problematic in the sense that all place names are presented in the Japanese katakana writing system, and in most cases, it is impossible to decipher the original Nordic names. Hence, the paper uses supplementary sources in both English and Icelandic to get an overview of the trip. Further research into other archives may later provide more details and clarity. The paper also benefits from a visit to examine the Otani Collection at the Omiya Library of Ryukoku University in Kyoto in summer 2022, which allowed for the examination of photographs and other primary sources. The photos from the Arctic trip remain unverified in terms of locations and require further study.

The paper also uses various secondary sources published in Japanese, English and Nordic languages. The first category relates to Otani’s life and work. Most studies in this category, however, are general biographies or texts focused on his explorations in Central Asia and hence serve as background information. The paper focuses on Otani’s early travels and career around the turn of the 20th century and is not meant to give a full overview of his eventful life. A recent book about Otani by the Japanese historian Honda Takashige (Reference Honda2016) is interesting as it includes the Arctic cruise, albeit briefly. Honda has systematically followed in Otani’s footsteps by visiting most of Otani’s destinations around the world, including Norway. Honda’s coverage of the Arctic, however, is mainly an attempt to give a personal impression of the sites that Otani visited rather than to present new research findings related to Otani’s travels in the North. Nonetheless, the book is helpful for this study as it provides context for Otani’s Arctic cruise in 1900.

A paper by Katayama Akio from 1998 is a rarity in the sense that it is probably the only research that specifically deals with travel writings from the Arctic cruise. Katayama lists – exhaustively, it seems – other Japanese texts that have referenced the travel accounts and then discusses the reliability of the travel writings by Otani and his team member Uehara. Katayama specifically discusses the differences and discrepancies between three written documents: the abovementioned texts by Uehara – that is, the travel diary written in 1900 and the book published in 1940 – and a travel description published in Otani’s name in 1901Footnote ². Katayama discusses various nuances in wording between the documents, but interestingly, the texts do not seem to reflect any major changes in worldview despite the enormous changes in international relations, and Japan’s place within them, that took place between 1900 and 1940. At least Katayama’s paper does not highlight such changes.

In addition to the Otani-focused sources, the paper consults a wide range of academic studies related to early Arctic tourism. The studies by historian Ulrike Spring deserve special mention, as many specifically deal with tourism development in northern Norway and the Nordic Arctic around the turn of the 20th century (Reference Spring and Hill2017a, Reference Spring, Hansson and Ryall2017b, Reference Spring2020). Likewise, studies by historians Sumarliði Ísleifsson (Reference Ísleifsson1996) and Arnþór Gunnarsson (Reference Gunnarsson2015) provide interesting insights into early tourism in Iceland around the same period.

This paper leaves a few issues unresolved that must be addressed in follow-up studies. In fact, the Japanese language poses challenges on multiple levels. First, texts written prior to the Second World War – that is, before the simplification of the kanji writing system – are difficult to read even for Japanese nationals unless they have received specific trainingFootnote ³. The poetry embedded in the text is particularly difficult. Uehara was known among his contemporaries as a skilled poet, and the text about the Arctic includes quite a few poems by Uehara written in the classical Chinese style. The poems are not included in the reading and interpretation of Uehara’s travel account. Second, certain aspects of Japanese grammar make the text somewhat vague. It is, for example, difficult to distinguish between singular and plural, and the subject in a sentence is often omitted. Hence, it is not always clear from Uehara’s descriptions of various excursions whether he was travelling alone or with some (or all) of his travel companionsFootnote ⁴. For more clarity, it would be interesting to cross-reference his writings with the other remaining diaries.

In preparation for this paper, an attempt has been made to consult both the Japanese primary sources and various supporting materials in Icelandic and English, especially to compensate for the mostly unrecognisable place names included in Uehara’s text. To fully digest and analyse the text and photographs, however, understanding of the Otani files, older forms of Japanese writing and knowledge of the Nordic destinations are required. This could be an ideal collaborative project with a Japanese scholar, and it would be interesting to produce a full translation of Uehara’s text, including the Chinese poetry.

For the discussion ahead, there is a need to consider the key concept “tourist” and different categories of travellers. According to the UN World Tourism Organization (UNWTO), a visitor (domestic, inbound or outbound) “is classified as a tourist (or overnight visitor), if the trip includes an overnight stay, or as a same-day visitor (or excursionist) otherwise” (“Glossary of …”, no date). A tourist is typically defined as a person whose travels last less than a year. In tourism literature, there are also many different definitions of tourists, reflecting the diverse modes and objectives of travel in different periods. For this paper, the discussion and definition by Spring (Reference Spring2020) are of particular interest. Spring contrasts her research findings with earlier studies that characterised early polar cruise tourists as relatively passive “deckchair explorers” (Kolltveit, Reference Kolltveit2006, as cited in Spring, Reference Spring2020, p. 40). Spring’s research, on the other hand, suggests that “many of these early tourists played a more active role than this term allows for” as some, for example, enjoyed walking the fjords and climbing mountains, while others gathered research material or went hunting. In Spring’s words, “they defied categorization into a single type of tourist: at most we may call them explorer tourists or explorer mass tourists, although this does not necessarily cover the scientists on board” (Reference Spring2020, p. 40). This paper will argue that the term “explorer tourist”, or even educational tourist, applies to Otani and his team members, given their general research and study focus, active travels and systematic documentation of their experiences. It should be stressed, however, that the term refers to an early type of tourism, not exploration, which would generally involve more agency on behalf of the participants.

Otani the explorer and the world of exploration around 1900

Otani Kozui (1876–1948) was born into a powerful religious family in Kyoto. His father Otani Koson was the Abbot of the Nishi Honganji Temple (also known as Nishi Hongwanji), which served as headquarters of the Honganji branch of Shin Buddhism (j. Jodo Shinshu Honganji-ha). The sect was the largest religious organisation in Japan at the time (Galambos, Reference Galambos2008, p. 1). As the oldest son, Otani Kozui received religious training from a young age and entered the Buddhist priesthood at the age of 10 (“Portraits of …”, no date). In 1898, at the age of 22, Otani married Kujo Kazuko whose younger sister would marry the Crown Prince of Japan in 1900 and be enthroned as Empress in 1912. Otani Kozui succeeded his father in 1903 as the 22nd Abbot of the Nishi Honganji Temple.

Although the Honganji sect was both the largest and richest religious organisation in Japan, Otani Kozui was concerned about the status of Buddhism, as the religion was in decline throughout Asia at the time (Galambos & Koichi, Reference Galambos and Kitsudo2012, p. 115). It was also a cause for concern that the Japanese government had heavily prioritised Shintoism over Buddhism since the Meiji Restoration of 1868, although Otani’s father had managed to “guide his sect safely through this period of turmoil” (Küçükyalçın, Reference Küçükyalçın2017a, p. 31). The situation made Otani curious about the religious situation in other countries and he soon became interested in missionary work, both the ways in which leading European countries carried out Christian missionary activities at home and abroad, and the ways Buddhism could be modernised and strengthened through missionary work. A year after his wedding, in 1899, Otani went on his first study trip abroad, travelling to Shanghai, Beijing and other cities, followed by a trip to India that same year. In 1900, he arrived in England with “the aim of learning about Western theology and religious practices” (Galambos, Reference Galambos2008, p. 1). While in London, Otani also became increasingly interested in European exploration in Central Asia, especially the work of the Swedish explorer Sven Hedin and the Hungarian-British archaeologist Aurel Stein. Otani made London his base, as he travelled – or sent his representatives – to various countries, including France, Germany, Austria and Italy (Honda, Reference Honda2016, p. 13). In 1900, Otani was approved as a member of the prestigious Royal Geographical Society in London (RGS, personal communication, 2023). When he travelled back to Japan in 1902, he went through Central Asia, making the first of what would become widely known as the Otani expeditions.

The 19th century had seen a series of remarkable expeditions around the world. Great Britain, which led the world in exploration, focused on four regions in the 19th century: the Arctic, Australia, Africa and Central Asia. By the late 1880s, “the explorers had nearly worked themselves out of a job” (Stafford, Reference Stafford, Porter and Louis1999, p. 300), for unknown frontiers and hinterlands were becoming a rarity. Exploration and imperial interests were closely related (Stafford, Reference Stafford, Porter and Louis1999); in fact, the same can be said of tourism and imperial ambitions (Hunter, Reference Hunter2004). The world of exploration was dominated by white men, mostly European, but Otani found it important that Japan, “as a newly modern nation, should not be left behind” (Kohl & Green, Reference Kohl, Green, Mueller and Salonia2022, pp. 211–212). Hence, Otani’s expeditions in Central Asia were, in part, motivated by patriotism, as “he felt this would enhance Japan’s prestige on the world stage, but he also felt that these were sacred sites and religious relics which should properly be explored and excavated by Asian Buddhists rather than European scholars and collectors” (ibid., pp. 211–212). This sense of competition and national pride can be seen in connection with other Japanese overseas ventures of this period, for example, Shirase Nobu’s Antarctic expedition in 1910–1912 (Barr, Reference Barr2013) and Maki Yuko who in the 1920s made first ascents of famous peaks in both Switzerland and Canada (Robinson, Reference Robinson and Chrétien2007). Both Shirase and Maki were welcomed as heroes when they returned to Japan.

Otani, both ambitious and wealthy, was successful in many respects. Imre Galambos (Reference Galambos2008) estimated, for example, that the collection brought back from the three Otani expeditions may have been the second-largest Central Asian collection, superseded only by Aurel Stein’s collection. Kohl and Green (Reference Kohl, Green, Mueller and Salonia2022) also emphasised that Otani’s objectives were “different in nature and far more extensive and ambitious than any of the European-sponsored expeditions” (p. 212). At the time, the European powers – led by Britain and Russia through their “Great Game” – were engaged in fierce competition over influence in and around Central Asia. Japanese participation in the exploration race in Asia was seen as highly suspicious – to the point that Otani and his team members were repeatedly suspected of espionage (Boyd, Reference Boyd2013; Kohl & Green, Reference Kohl, Green, Mueller and Salonia2022).

At the turn of the 20th century, Japan had only been “open” to the outside world for a little over four decades. In the 1630s, the Tokugawa military government took steps that “sharply reduced the Japanese ties to the West” until the 1850s (Gordon, Reference Gordon2020, p. 19). After more than two centuries of self-imposed seclusion, Japan established trade and diplomatic relations with the United States in the 1850s and diplomatic treaties with leading European countries soon followed. From the 1860s onward, first the shogunate and later the new Japanese government dispatched diplomatic missions to Europe and the United States, such as the famous Iwakura Mission of 1871–1873, with the aim of bringing back knowledge of the Western world. Young Japanese were also sent abroad to study from the 1860s onwards and important steps were taken around 1870 that enabled more people to travel abroad. For example, a procedure was established in 1871 through which the Japanese could submit applications to go overseas (Ishizuki, Reference Ishizuki and Burks1985). Within a decade of the Meiji Restoration in 1868, it is estimated that several hundred Japanese were studying in the United States and Europe (McClain, Reference McClain2002, p. 171). Although the worldview of most Japanese was rapidly expanding during the late 19th century, not many had the opportunity to travel abroad. In contrast, domestic travels had become commodified already by the early 19th century (Leheny, Reference Leheny2003). The travel scene changed dramatically in 1906 with the start of what Kate McDonald (Reference McDonald2017) calls “imperial tourism”, which gave many Japanese an opportunity to experience firsthand the colonised lands that made up imperial Japan. Ariyama (Reference Ariyama2002) has referred to the start of these trips as the “birth of overseas tourism”, causing a boom in travels to nearby Korea and Manchuria (pp. 30-39). However, Otani’s extensive travels and endeavours, which brought him and his team members on long trips all over Europe and through the interior of Central Asia alike, were a rarity that few could afford.

During Otani’s study trip to England, he went on the northern cruise in the summer of 1900, and evidence suggests that he and his travel companions may have been among the first, if not the first, Japanese to travel so far north into the Nordic Arctic, reaching the island of Spitsbergen (Svalbard) on 19 July. Otani was not, however, the first Japanese to cross the Arctic Circle. Long before Japanese nationals attempted any sort of polar exploration, either Arctic or Antarctic, commercial interests brought one Japanese into the Arctic Circle. In 1897, the Japanese businessman Oka Juro (1870–1923) visited Finnmark in northern Norway to explore Norwegian whaling, then famous for the grenade harpoon, which was developed by Svend Foyn in the 1860s. According to the Norwegian whaling historian Johannes Th. Tønnesen, Oka travelled to Norway on a semi-official trip, visiting Kristiania and Vestfoldbyene and then Finnmark (Reference Tønnesen1967, p. 195), which at 70 degrees north is firmly located within the Arctic Circle. On his way back to Japan, he visited the Azores and Newfoundland, also to study whaling practices (ibid., p. 196). Many more Japanese whaling experts visited Norway in the following years, but Oka remained most prominent when it came to spreading knowledge of the “Norwegian system” for whaling in Japan (Mageli, Reference Mageli2006, p. 110). In the 1890s, whaling also brought Japanese adventurer Wada Jujiro into the Arctic, although on the North American side (Matsuura et al., 2014, p. 166).

It was not until over a decade later, 1910–1912, that the Japanese explorer Shirase Nobu (1861–1946) made his expedition to Antarctica. Japanese whaling companies would later send annual whaling expeditions to Antarctic waters, starting in 1934 (Mageli, Reference Mageli2006, pp. 116–118). Though Japan was among the original signatories of the Spitsbergen Treaty in the mid-1920s, formal Japanese expeditions to the Arctic did not start until later. In the 1920s, the Bureau of Fisheries commissioned Taketomi Eiichi (1886–1955) to study the far north to bolster Japan’s fishing industry (Stevenson, Reference Stevenson, Launius, Fleming and DeVorkin2010). Taketomi, taking interest in polar science, “crossed into the Arctic Ocean on his first voyage in 1923 and would return many times over the following two decades” (ibid., p. 128). In 1941, Taketomi attempted with official support to sail the vessel Kaiho through what is now known as the Northern Sea Route (NSR) and, from there, to cross the globe to the Antarctic (Nobunaga, 2012, as cited in Tonami, Reference Tonami2016). Though the Kaiho never got further than the Bering Strait before it had to sail back to Japan, the attempt marked an important milestone. Interestingly, both Oka and Otani made their way into the Arctic Circle well ahead of Taketomi.

The Otani team’s northern cruise

As mentioned earlier, this paper uses Uehara Yoshitaro’s travel book from 1940 as the main source about Otani’s northern cruise in the summer of 1900. Like Otani, Uehara was probably among the most widely travelled individuals of his generation. A promotional text presents the book as follows:

The text is no overstatement: the 400-page book describes Uehara’s travels to modern-day Canada, the US, Australia, China, Korea, India, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Myanmar, Singapore, Hong Kong, Egypt, Britain, France (including the Expo in Paris), Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany, the Czech Republic, Austria, and, as will be discussed in this section, Norway and Iceland.

Many of the trips were made on behalf of the Honganji organisation. Some were made in preparation for missionary activities, but they often included personal assistance to Otani, such as ensuring a visa for Otani’s upcoming trips. In general, Uehara was described as a “close aide” of Otani (Shirasu, Reference Shirasu2004, p. 8). The other members of the travel team were Honda Eryu (1876–1944) and Hori Masuo (1880–1949). Honda was the first of the group members to arrive in London, in December 1899, followed by Otani in March 1900 and then Hori and Uehara, who both arrived just one day before the Cuzco departed on 3 July 1900 (Honda, Reference Honda2016, pp. 14–20). Otani’s friends and colleagues conducted various studies and research that would benefit his exploration of Central Asia. For example, Hori would spend his time in Britain studying geography at Oxford University, specialising in cartography (Honda, Reference Honda2016, p. 18).

Nordic location names in Uehara’s text are, as noted, almost impossible to decipher, apart from major cities and destinations. Luckily, however, there are other sources available which can provide information about the travel route. The advertisements in British newspapers in the months before the cruise give a basic outline. In May 1900, an ad in the Glasgow Herald announced the following destinations for the “Orient Company’s Pleasure Cruises” aboard the Cuzco: Bergen, Gudvangen, Balholmen, Naes (for Romsdal Valley), Molde, Trondhjem, Tromso, Hammerfest, North Cape, Spitsbergen, Reykjavik (Iceland) and Thorshaven (Faroe Islands) (“Orient Company’s …”, 1900, p. 14, spelling as in ad). The almost 4,000-tonne cruiser would leave London on 3 July and return on 4 August. According to the ad, passengers could expect “High-class Cuisine, String Band, &c” (ibid.).

During the second half of the 19th century, the Norwegian fjords and northern Norway became increasingly popular tourist destinations. The North Cape in particular, earlier known as the northernmost tip of the European continent, increasingly attracted tourists from the 1870s onwards (Spring, Reference Spring, Hansson and Ryall2017b). In the 1890s, the growing European tourism industry also discovered the Spitsbergen archipelago as a travel destination. Located considerably further north, Spitsbergen gradually replaced the North Cape as the “border between the known and the unknown” (Spring, Reference Spring2020, p. 39). The surge in tourism to these regions was made possible by rapid improvements in infrastructure in Norway, which included “new roads, electricity, telegraph stations and hotels, but also steamships which made it possible to transport large numbers of passengers” (Spring, Reference Spring, Hansson and Ryall2017b, pp. 130–131).

According to Uehara’s travel account, the ship departed from London as planned on 3 July 1900. Uehara himself had arrived in London just the day before and was informed by Otani that they would depart for the Arctic the following morning, indicating that all travel decisions had been made by Otani (Uehara, Reference Uehara1940, p. 116). Most of the travel days on land were spent in Norway, and consequently it is not surprising that most of the pages in Uehara’s writing are devoted to Norway. Of the 22 pages that Uehara writes about the northern cruise, the first 18 pages are about Norway and Spitsbergen, whereas just over four pages are written about Iceland. Torshavn is barely mentioned, as none of the passengers could disembark the ship there due to heavy rain. The main stops are recorded as follows (see also Fig. 1):

Figure 1.

The main destinations of the Cuzco during the Arctic cruise.

Uehara’s fascination with Norway can be strongly sensed through his writing. Excursions were available at every major destination and Uehara actively participated in trips inland, which, in some cases, included overnight stays at hotels or inns. Although Uehara visited churches, museums, cafes and markets, his experience of nature is the most prominent theme. Uehara obviously enjoys the Norwegian scenery, as he describes beautiful fjords, mountains, cliffs, waterfalls, mountain lakes, rivers and green fields. He also frequently mentions the bright summer nights and the midnight sun, which gave a magical touch to the Nordic landscape. The tours were often conducted by means of horse-drawn carriages, but they also included hiking trips on foot. The reader can sense that Uehara is impressed by the infrastructure in Norway; more than once, he mentions that the roads are good, allowing the group to reach even difficult mountain destinations. He is also surprised by the cleanliness of the northern fishing towns that he visits. Sometimes the scenery reminds Uehara of Japanese landscapes, as often depicted in classic Japanese paintings, but he writes that thanks to the Norwegian roads, the dramatic landscapes are probably more accessible in Norway than in Japan.

Between the destinations of the Seven Sisters and Tromsø, the ship crossed the Arctic Circle and the ship fired five celebratory shots to mark the occasion (Uehara, Reference Uehara1940, p. 127). While in Tromsø in northern Norway, Uehara joined a tour to Lyngenfjord. Underway, the group had the opportunity to visit a Sámi (“Lapp”) village, where the round houses reminded Uehara of round Mongolian tents (p. 129). As the ship progresses further north in Uehara’s writing, readers can sense the air becoming cooler, the wind stronger, and the fog thicker and more frequent. One of the highlights of the trip to Norway was reaching the North Cape, which was generally seen as the northernmost point of the European Continent. According to Ulrike Spring, newspapers still made reports about individuals who had reached the Cape until the early 1880s (Reference Spring, Hansson and Ryall2017b, p. 138). This changed in the following years, however, due to the growth of organised tourism, and reaching the Cape became “a part of a modern collective experience” (ibid., p. 138). Spring also argues that the North Cape itself became an important tourist identity, as … “the physical constructions erected at the top of the cliff and the socio-cultural practices enacted there created imaginaries that linked the tourists’ present experiences to previous and future ones and evoked associations and identifications across space and time” (ibid., p. 142).

The status of the North Cape as a tourist destination can be felt in both the visual and textual sources preserved in the Otani archives at Ryukoku University. Uehara’s book from 1940 tells the story of the Otani team’s ascent to the Cape on 16 July 1900, a rather foggy and humid summer day. Uehara explains how they benefitted from the iron pillars and ropes along the slope, and how sailors from the ship also assisted female and elderly passengers who had joined the climb. At the top of the cliff, there was both a memorial commemorating the accession of the King of Sweden and Norway in 1873 and an octagonal pavilion, where passengers could enjoy a glass of celebratory drink (many sources mention champagne drinking at the top). Uehara also refers to the writing of commemorative postcards, which was a widespread practice at the time. The status of the Cape as a “tourist identity” – to use Spring’s term – can further be sensed through photos preserved from the trip. Whereas many of the photographs give the impression of somewhat casual landscape snapshots, the photographs from the North Cape show the Otani team posing with the octagonal pavilion serving as a clear landmark in the background (Fig. 2). After the evening hike, a very late 2 am dinner awaited the passengers on the ship, causing some among them to cheer for the “midnight sun and midnight supper” (Uehara, Reference Uehara1940, p. 132).

Figure 2.

(From left) Uehara, probably Hori and Otani at the North Cape. Photo: By courtesy of the Otani Collection at Ryukoku University.

After the Cape, the ship turned towards the open sea, where it encountered both thick fog and increasingly large spreads of drift ice, which Uehara refers to as “ice parks” (Uehara, Reference Uehara1940, p. 133). One morning when the passengers woke up, the ship was blocked by drift ice, forcing it to change course to find a warm current. On top of that, the weather had turned from foggy to “threatening”, and the ship felt out of control. According to Uehara, some of the women still grabbed the first mate and urged him to go north “even by an inch and try to set a new record” (ibid., p. 136). The ship finally reached Spitsbergen on 19 July. On the way, the vessel proceeded north to 78°40′N, then headed slightly south and carefully entered Bellsund Bay, anchoring at 77°49′19” (ibid., p. 137). As fog was a constant threat, those who ventured on land were urged to stay in groups. Uehara and his friends went ashore, and he describes the delicate vegetation in this “silver world of white ice and snow”: a desolate world of glaciers and snowy mountains, with only a hut with whale bones and commemorative wooden markers in the ground which had been raised by previous visitors (ibid., p. 138).

On 26 July, the ship arrived in Reykjavik, the capital of Iceland. Uehara strolled around the city, visiting the main sights. In contrast to Norway, Iceland was a relatively new destination for large-scale tourism, and infrastructure was far below the standard that Cuzco passengers had experienced in Norway. In fact, both Reykjavik and the country more generally were known for poor and sometimes non-existent roads and other travel infrastructure in the 19th century (Jónsdóttir & Johnson, Reference Jónsdóttir and Johnson2014), although some foreigners also saw charm in horseback riding and the escape from more industrialised countries with roads and railways (Ísleifsson, Reference Ísleifsson1996, pp. 154–155). Indeed, Uehara describes Reykjavik with two characteristics: poor roads and metal roofs (Reference Uehara1940, p. 140).

On the 27th, Cuzco passengers could choose between visiting a hot spring area in the periphery of Reykjavik or Thingvellir, about 50 km from Reykjavik. Uehara and his friends joined the latter excursion and departed Reykjavik in the morning in a group of 30 men and five women. The language is often difficult, but Uehara describes travelling on horseback along a narrow path for many miles, mostly without a single house in sight. The experience is rather gloomy, with “dark clouds hanging low, and hat and clothes wet from cold rain” (Uehara, Reference Uehara1940, p. 141). They finally approached the lake at Thingvellir, entering the famous Almannagjá, a deep and wide gorge cutting through the surrounding lava, known for both its geology and historical significance as the assembly place of Iceland’s parliament since the year 930. Despite the rain, Uehara enjoyed the blue mountains, the clear lake and the “quiet and pure scenery” (p. 142). Around half past six in the evening, they reached their resting place along the shore of the lake: a building with a dining hall at the centre and hotel wings on both sides. The description of the building can only refer to Hotel Valhöll, which had just been completed in 1898 and begun operating at the end of June 1899. Apart from Valhöll, there were very few commercial tourist services outside major towns around the year 1900. Services included accommodation, hot meals and other refreshments (“Þingvallaskálinn”, 1899, p. 116). Possibly due to lack of vacancy, Uehara and his friends stayed not at Valhöll, which apparently was both “cramped and crowded” (p. 142), but at a nearby pastor’s house. Although first suspecting some kind of prejudice behind this arrangement, they settled on the pastor’s house after inspecting it, not least because of the great view of the lake as promised by the Thomas Cook representative. From there, they could also hear the echo of the Öxará waterfall plunging into the gorge as they went to bed. The overall effect seems to have been quite enchanting, so much so that his travel companion Honda even jokingly asked whether Uehara would not consider becoming the pastor of the church at Thingvellir. Once they were back in Reykjavík, after this last excursion of their journey, they all boarded the ship again. In the afternoon, the ship was hit with intense rain and wind. The bad weather continued, and when the ship arrived in Torshavn in the Faroe Islands two days later, no one left the ship due to heavy rain. The ship then set its course for the British Isles.

Asians on a European pleasure cruise

The four Japanese gentlemen aboard the Cuzco drew considerable attention due to their nationality. Most Icelandic newspapers and journals that reported about the arrival of the Cuzco in the summer of 1900 noted the four Japanese passengers, even when no other passengers were mentioned. It is clear from these brief accounts that the Japanese passengers’ presence on board was considered interesting news. Indeed, the Otani team may have been the first Japanese ever to visit Iceland (for other early visits see Ingvarsdóttir, Reference Ingvarsdóttir2017).

Icelandic historian Arnþór Gunnarsson (Reference Gunnarsson2015) has studied early tourism to Iceland in the period 1858–1914, during which the appearance of cruise ship tourism to Reykjavík after the 1890s is one of the major trends. According to Gunnarsson, three cruise ships visited Reykjavík in the years 1897–1900, with over 400 passengers in total (p. 93). Two of the ships were British and the third was from the United States. The Cuzco is most likely one of the three ships. In general, most tourists to Iceland in the period 1858–1914 were British (ibid., p. 72), but the passengers on board the cruise ships tended to be very multinational, albeit overwhelmingly white and “Western”. No data exists that can give historians a full overview of the number and nationality of visitors in this period. We have, however, some indicators. Gunnarsson demonstrates, for example, how the Icelandic media in one case listed how many letters and postcards were shipped to different countries when the German cruise ship Grosser Kurfurst visited Reykjavík in 1910 with 350 passengers on board. Approximately 4,600 greetings were posted in Reykjavík and most of them were sent to leading European countries and the United States. The last 125 letters were shipped to a mixed category of “other countries” (ibid., pp. 94–95). If there were customers other than Europeans and North Americans on board the cruise ships, they seem to have been a minority.

The Cuzco was a relatively large ship, but it is not clear exactly how many passengers it carried or how many nationalities were represented. In his travel article from 1901, Otani writes that there were 1080 passengers – which is an error – and that around eight out of ten passengers were English, while the remaining passengers came from France, Italy, the United States, Australia and Hong Kong (as cited in Katayama, Reference Katayama1998, p. 51). Uehara, on the other hand, writes that there were 184 passengers and that Otani and friends were the only Asians (as cited in Katayama, Reference Katayama1998, pp. 52 & 55). When the Cuzco arrived in Reykjavik, the Icelandic news magazine Ísafold reported that the ship had 120 passengers, most of them English but also four Japanese (“Skemmtiferðaskipið enska”, 1900, p. 185). A possible explanation as to why Otani mentions passengers from Hong Kong, while Uehara writes that they were the only Asian passengers, could be that the passengers from Hong Kong were crew rather than paying customers. Indeed, an Icelandic source from a decade later mentions the locals’ surprise when “… a few Chinese came ashore, crewmembers of the ship. They were dressed in silk clothing with raven-black braids that reached down to their calves” (Fjallkonan, 1910, as cited in Gunnarsson, Reference Gunnarsson2015, p. 95). It would be interesting to know more about the international crew on board the ship, but that is outside the scope of this study.

In the Icelandic newspapers, the high-ranking European passengers are mentioned with their titles, while the four Japanese are noted only for their nationality. This is not an oversight but rather a consequence of the registration on the Cuzco passenger list. In fact, Uehara writes in his travel account from 1940 about the day of departure, when the printed passenger list was distributed among the passengers: “The passengers were introduced by their status and nationality such as members of the nobility, soldiers, bankers, merchants or industrialists, missionaries, writers, doctors, etc., but the four of us were simply described as Japanese, nothing more” (p. 133)Footnote ⁵. The matter made Uehara and his travel companions conscious of discrimination that they might encounter during the trip as “Orientals”. Luckily, they were not subjected to any degrading behaviour on the ship, which made them agree to actively participate in the excursions and be sure to take the lead in riding wagons, climbing mountains and so on (p. 133).

The widely travelled Uehara was happy to experience the polite and respectful behaviour of the Cuzco crew, knowing all too well that such behaviour could not be taken for granted. Uehara had, for instance, been attacked by a boy in New York who threw stones at him while shouting “Chinaman”. Nonetheless, various cultural differences became apparent. Three Australian ladies who had sleeping cabins near the Japanese group on the ship instructed them to smile less:

Setting a record – the Otani team joins the Arctic Circle Society

Both in Japan and internationally, Otani and his closest collaborators are known for their expeditions of Central Asia rather than in the context of the Arctic or Asian ventures into the Arctic. At the time, however, over a century ago, their Arctic cruise did not go entirely unnoticed. In his book from 1940, Uehara mentions that in 1936 he accepted an invitation to join the Arctic Circle Society. Uehara writes:

The record held by Uehara and his travel companions as the first members to enter the Arctic Circle refers to the trip to Bellsund on Svalbard, but it is not clear where the foreign gentleman travelled to. It could be the city of Hammerfest, which Uehara refers to as exactly 70°40′ in his book, but that might be a sheer coincidence. It is strange that Otani’s name is not mentioned along with Honda, Hori and Uehara. A potential explanation is simply that Otani may not have joined the society. Otani retired from the Honganji organisation in 1914 due to a financial scandal and was based abroad, mainly in China for many years after that (Küçükyalçın, Reference Küçükyalçın and Esenbel2017, pp. 182–183). From the quotation above, it is clear that the members of the society considered Honda, Hori and Uehara the first among them to cross the Arctic Circle.

It raises the question of whether they were considered the first Japanese to reach this milestone. As mentioned earlier, the Japanese whaling expert Oka Juro visited northern Norway, well within the Arctic Circle, as early as 1897. It is not clear whether the members of the society had any knowledge of Oka’s travels. Oka certainly never had a chance to become a member, as he died in 1923. Regarding potential records, what can be said with certainty is that Honda, Hori and Uehara were the first among the society’s members to reach the Arctic Circle (among those who had become members by 1940, when Uehara published his book).

It is interesting that an Arctic Circle Society had already been established in Japan in 1931, but unfortunately there is very limited information to be found about the society. At the time when Uehara joined the Society, it was relatively new. (Not all sources agree on the year of its establishment, but it was probably established in 1931). An article in the newspaper Asahi Shimbun announced the “birth” of the society and its first meeting in September 1931. The article has an adventurous feel to it and is titled “An Arctic Circle Society born in Osaka”. It reads as follows:

Takeuchi and Wada were leading figures in the early years of the society. According to Takeuchi’s memoir, he visited Magdalena Bay, 81°N, in Svalbard in 1929 as a part of an Arctic cruise (Takeuchi, Reference Takeuchi1972). He was accompanied on the trip by Wada, Harada and Matsuo who were also mentioned as founding members of the society in the Asahi Shimbun article. Although the founding members were mainly scholars at prestigious universities, their interest in the Arctic was probably primarily a hobby and outside their academic fields. It is not clear how long the society operated, but it can be said with certainty that it still existed in 1958 when Prince Mikasa joined one of the society’s meetings (Takeuchi, Reference Takeuchi1972).