insights from frontier Japan

Low-cost carrier (LCC) Peach Aviation (Osaka Prefecture) will commence a Memanbetsu – Kansai (Osaka) flight starting on July 1. This will be the first regular LCC flight connecting Eastern Hokkaido's Okhotsk region to Kansai. One flight departing from each location will operate per day.

Koinobori carp streamers were raised on April 16 at the schoolyard in Kaminikoro Elementary School in Eastern Hokkaido's city of Kitami. The 22 koinobori streamers colored red, blue, and green swam leisurely amidst the rural region wind.

The herring fishing season is reaching its peak in the Okhotsk region. Known in Japan as the “spring fish,” herrings herald the arrival of spring in the sea from which the drift ice has disappeared.

Basket fishing for horsehair crab – which heralds the coming of spring on the Okhotsk Sea coast – has begun, with approximately 3.9 tons of horsehair crab landed at the Oumu Fishing Port in the town of Oumu in the Okhotsk region on March 17.

Fifty lambs have been born on Tanaka Makoto’s dairy farm in the town of Oketo in the Okhotsk region of eastern Hokkaido. The lambs scamper around inside the barn with a liveliness reminiscent of a sports day.

One hundred and fifteen fishing boats hauled ashore to avoid the drift ice off the Okhotsk Sea coast in Tokoro-cho in Kitami in eastern Hokkaido are waiting to leave the port to go fishing. Work to return the fishing boats to the sea began on March 3. March 20 is the date when, in normal years, the “opening of the sea” – when the amount of drift ice reduces enough for the boats to set sail – usually occurs.

Kyudo (Japanese archery) teams from 12 high schools in Hokkaido linked their kyudo training halls together via the online conference system "Zoom" and held an archery competition on February 27.

Scheduled flights by a low-cost carrier (LCC) airline, linking Honshu and Memanbetsu Airport in the northeastern Hokkaido town of Ozora, long awaited by people of the region, began on February 10.

Wintertime in Eastern Hokkaido is packed with amazing scenery and experiences not available elsewhere in Japan, like drift ice, art made from snow and ice, and the ice horizon expanse. The "East Hokkaido Express Bus" is a seasonal bus that travels to all sorts of tourist spots in wintertime Eastern Hokkaido. It gives you easy access to famous spots difficult to reach by car. Visit Eastern Hokkaido aboard buses in search of amazing experiences only available there!