I’ve joined a nature cruising tour in the sea of Rausu in Hokkaido! You can enjoy drift ice & bird watching in winter and dolphin & whale watching in summer! The large panorama of the Shiretoko Peninsula and Kunashiri Island was spectacular!

Rausu Town in Hokkaido is located on the east side of the Shiretoko Peninsula. In the Nemuro Strait off the coast of Rausu, you can enjoy a nature cruising tour that you can enjoy the magnificent scenery of the Shiretoko Peninsula, a World Natural Heritage Site, and Kunashiri Island in the Northern Territories. You can also observe marine mammals such as orcas, whales, and dolphins in summer, and rare birds such as Steller’s Sea Eagles and White-tailed Eagles and floating ice drifted from Siberia in winter. Sightseeing boats are in service from Rausu Port.

The Nemuro Strait is the strait located between the eastern coast of Hokkaido and Kunashiri Island. The sea area connecting Cape Shiretoko and Cape Rurui of Kunashiri Island for about 70 kilometers is called Kita-guchi (the north exit), and the sea area connecting Cape Nosappu and Keramuizaki of Kunashiri Island for about 35 kilometers is called Minami-guchi (the south exit).

Every winter, a lot of drift ice rushes from Siberia to the Sea of Okhotsk, and plankton is also carried along with the drift ice. In spring, when solar radiation increases, plankton increases, and fish gather to eat the plankton, and orcas, whales, and dolphins come to the coast of Rausu during the period from spring through autumn every year to eat the fish.

Every year from February to March, Steller’s sea eagle and white-tailed eagle, which are national natural monuments, come to Hokkaido on the coast of the Sea of Okhotsk with drift ice to winter. The Sea of Okhotsk is the southern limit where drift ice can be seen, but Utoro on the west side of the Shiretoko Peninsula is topographically prone to drift ice retention and has a high drift ice density, so Steller’s sea eagles and white-tailed eagles cannot catch food, and they catch food off the coast of Rausu in the Nemuro Strait, where the drift ice density is low. During the drift ice season, you can enjoy bird watching of sea eagles and white-tailed eagles along with the drift ice.

In Rausu, there is Kujira-no-Mieru-Oka-Koen (whale watching park) where you can see sperm whales squirting even from land. It is said that sperm whales dive in the deep sea at a depth of 2,000 meters or more to carry out predatory activities, so you cannot see sperm whales from land unless there is a deep sea near the land, but the depth of central part of the north exit off the coast of Rausu is more than 2,400 meters, so sperm whales can live there. When visiting whale watching park, you should bring binoculars. It seems that a sunny day in August is the best time to visit there. Even if you can’t see the whales squirting, if it’s sunny, you can still see the magnificent scenery of Kunashiri Island in the Northern Territories.