Pseudo Nim

Looks like I'm going to be in Wakkanai either in the first or the second week of November. Since there's nothing much to do there, I was thinking of taking the ferry over to one of the two islands for the day. Is it worth it? I understand flower season is long over - is there anything to see in the cold November days? Or should I abandon the idea and go another year? (not sure if I ever would, just conveniently going to WKJ this time...)

nishimark

The tourist association page:
http://www.welcome.wakkanai.hokkaido.jp/en/

You've probably already seen it, but I'm posting it because it's the first tourist association page I've seen that includes a "Gas station" list as one of the highlights.

Pseudo Nim

Hahaha. Yep.

Daichovo

Hey, did you go? How was it? I will go in May and hit up Rebun and Rishiri once my "stay" is done. Not to mention the Siberia ferry...

Pseudo Nim

I went, but not to Rebun or Rishiri in the end, because the timing of flights into Wakkanai was so awful that I would have had to spend far too many days there after all. Wakkanai was COLD COLD COLD in November. Landing was pretty iffy because of the crosswinds, wind was so strong on the tarmac I was almost blown away on the short trek from the plane to the building, there were virtually no people in Wakkanai, and the return flight got hit by lightning on landing, so they aborted the landing, sent the plane to Sapporo, causing me to have to take an overnight bus to Sapporo to make my next day connection back to Tokyo (and go to the office, which was kind of the whole point of coming to Japan in the first place, haha). Oh yeah, and I made it to Soya-misaki (the northernmost point of Japan), but it was so cold that I stayed there for exactly the 25 minutes that the bus service runs at, took a few pictures and ran for it.

All in all, I really enjoyed the planned-to-be 6 hours (that ended up being more like 12 because of waiting for the bus) in Wakkanai. I think in summer, it'd be a really pretty place to visit. Just don't go in November.

I'll probably update this thread with my trip report once I finish writing it on my blog, hehe.

joejones

I went to WKJ in the middle of summer and it was still pretty chilly there (jacket weather).