WILDS OF HOKKAIDO

RAUSU, Hokkaido — A newly opened guesthouse for foreign visitors in Rausu, Hokkaido, is gaining in popularity, as the season for drift ice has come to the Shiretoko Peninsula.

Drawn to the great natural beauty of Shiretoko, a UNESCO World Natural Heritage site, many tourists from Asia, Europe and the United States have made reservations. The guesthouse, called Shiretoko Serai, is said to be almost fully booked, especially in late February.

The town government and people involved in local tourism have high hopes for the facility, as it specifically caters to foreigners.

Saiyu Travel Co., headquartered in Tokyo, opened the facility last July. The two-story wooden main building and two annexes have a total of 10 rooms and a capacity for 23 guests. Serai means “palace” or “inn” in Persian, and a place where traveling merchants could rest along the Silk Road was called “caravan serai” — which is the origin of the English word caravansary.

In response to the rapid increase in the number of foreign visitors to Japan, Saiyu Travel, which has a network overseas as well as in Japan, looked for an unexplored region of the nation. Spotlighting Rausu, a town on the Shiretoko Peninsula, the travel agency organized a tour including the town. It decided to open a guesthouse there for foreign visitors as there was no such accommodation in the town.

In addition to tourists from China, Taiwan, South Korea and other Asian countries, those from Europe, the United States and elsewhere have visited the lodging facility to see whales, Steller’s sea eagles and brown bears. The guesthouse was reportedly fully booked for its debut season last summer.

Manager Shohei Morita, 27, who also cooks, serves Western cuisine using local seafood and guides foreigners around the area.

“It is very valuable that there is accommodation with English-speaking staff in our town,” Ikuyo Wakabayashi, executive director of the Shiretoko Rausu Tourism Association, said.

Tours to see drift ice attract a large number of foreign visitors every year.

Representatives of overseas travel agencies and others also visit Shiretoko Serai. “I would like to improve the quality of cuisine and our services so that guests feel more comfortable,” Morita said.

“I am very grateful that there are places to accept foreign visitors,” Rausu Mayor Minoru Minatoya said.

Yomiuri Shimbun photos Tourists photograph scenery from a ship in Rausu, Hokkaido, in late February 2018.

Steller’s sea eagles and other birds gather to eat fish thrown from a tourist ship