One of Hokkaido's 179 towns
Urahoro浦幌町
Grain fields that end at a Pacific cliff
Tokachi region · Hokkaido's breadbasket — big skies, gardens and food at the source.
Urahoro rolls from Tokachi grain fields down to a wild Pacific shore — quiet farm country with clifftop ocean lookouts.
Urahoro is the eastern edge of Tokachi, where the grain fields roll over low hills and drop to a wild stretch of Pacific coast on the way to Kushiro. Its best-known spot is a clifftop lookout at Konbukariishi with nothing between you and the curve of the horizon. Inland there are a hot spring in the hills, a town museum on the Ainu and settler past, and a roadside station on the main road. It is an unhurried stop for drivers between Obihiro and Kushiro.
- Region
- Tokachi (十勝)
- From New Chitose Airport
- ~220 km · 3.4 h summer / 4 h winter
- From Sapporo
- ~257 km · 3.9 h summer / 4.7 h winter
- Best season in Tokachi
- June–September for gardens and farm country in full growth; winter brings dry blue-sky cold and hot springs.
Urahoro at a glance
Drive estimates: straight-line × 1.35, at 65 km/h (summer) / 55 km/h (winter). How we calculate
What to see in Urahoro
Konbukariishi Observatory
昆布刈石展望台
A lookout on the sea cliffs east of the Tokachi River mouth, reached by a gravel road, with a clear view along the coast and out to a horizon that visibly curves. Fog can hide it all in summer.
Urahoro Museum
浦幌町立博物館
The town museum covers the Ainu people of the coast, the settlers who broke the fields and the natural history of the river mouth, with a good collection of everyday objects.
Ruma Onsen
留真温泉
A town-run hot spring in the hills north of the centre, known for its alkaline water and a quiet valley setting under forest, a different face of a town otherwise known for its fields and coast.
Michi-no-Eki Urahoro
道の駅うらほろ
The roadside station on National Route 38 near the centre, with the town's beans, wheat products and seafood from the coast, a convenient break between Obihiro and Kushiro.
Getting to Urahoro
Urahoro station on the JR Nemuro Main Line is about an hour from Obihiro by local train; limited expresses toward Kushiro also stop. National Route 38 runs through the town and Route 336 follows the coast. By car it is a little over an hour from Obihiro and an hour from Kushiro, and Tokachi-Obihiro Airport is about 1.5 hours.
Tokachi region: Fly to Tokachi-Obihiro Airport or take the JR limited express from Sapporo (about 2.5 hours). A car unlocks the garden road.
When to visit Urahoro
August to September, when the wheat has been cut and the beans ripen and the coast is at its least foggy. October to November for salmon at the river mouths. Winter is sharp and bright inland, and the cliff lookout is at its clearest on cold days.
What to eat in Urahoro
Wheat, beans and potatoes from the hills, beef and dairy from pastures inland, and salmon, kelp and shishamo from the short coastline. Konbukariishi itself is named for the kelp once harvested below the cliffs.
Urahoro in context: the Tokachi region
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Tokachi is agricultural Hokkaido at full scale: a vast inland plain where the fields run to the horizon and much of what Japan eats is grown. Obihiro, its capital, invented butadon — the caramelized pork rice bowl — and keeps the world's only banei draft-horse racing.