Rumoi 留萌振興局

The 2020 Census figures total 43,050.⁵ The preliminary 2025 counts are Rumoi 17,360, Mashike 3,343, Obira 2,562, Tomamae 2,560, Haboro 5,642, Shosanbetsu 946, Enbetsu 2,163 and Teshio 2,535.⁶ Each municipality's file gives its latest resident-register figure.

• Shape and neighbors: Rumoi lies in the northwest of Hokkaido and faces the Sea of Japan to the west. Across the Teshio River to the north is Soya. The Mashike Mountains separate it from Ishikari to the south, and the Teshio Mountains from Kamikawa and Sorachi to the east.¹
• Landforms: In the center and south, hills come close to the coast and flat land lies mainly along the rivers.¹ Farmland is spread out in strips along the river valleys, like the teeth of a comb.²² Forest covers about 286,000 ha, or 83% of the land, the second-highest share of Hokkaido's 14 subprefectures. National forest makes up 66% of it.²⁴²
• Mashike Mountains: A group of volcanoes whose main peak is Mt. Shokanbetsu (暑寒別岳, 1,492 m), with a line of peaks around 1,000 m high. At their western end they fall into the sea as the cliffs of the Ofuyu coast. Alpine flowers cover the summits, including the endemic Mashike-genge and Mashike-otogiri.¹⁸
• Teshio River: At 256 km, the Teshio River (天塩川) is the second-longest river in Hokkaido after the Ishikari and the fourth-longest in Japan. It drains 5,590 km² and reaches the sea at Teshio.²³
• Islands: Teuri and Yagishiri lie off Haboro.¹⁸
  • Teuri's west coast is a breeding ground for eight seabird species, including an estimated 800,000 rhinoceros auklets. It is a national Natural Monument and a special protection area.¹⁸ The island's tourism site calls this the largest rhinoceros auklet colony in the world, and Teuri the only breeding site in Japan of the common murre (ウミガラス), known locally as the "Orolon bird".³
  • The murre count reached 104 in 2022. It was the first time it had passed 100 since the Ministry of the Environment began its recovery program in 2001, and the subprefecture's chart shows 135 in 2025.¹⁸
  • Yagishiri's natural forest has about 150,000 trees of some 50 species, mainly Japanese yew (onko). It is a national Natural Monument. Pastures of Suffolk sheep fill the middle of the island.¹⁸
• Quasi-national park: The Shokanbetsu-Teuri-Yagishiri Quasi-National Park (暑寒別天売焼尻国定公園) was designated on 1 August 1990 and covers 43,559 ha. Inside the subprefecture it takes in the Ofuyu coast and the Mashike Mountains in Mashike (17,846 ha) and the two islands of Haboro (1,081 ha).¹⁸
• Climate: The climate is of the Sea of Japan type. The Tsushima Current keeps it fairly mild for its latitude. It warms quickly when the snow melts in early April, and winds and seas are mostly calm until August. Autumn is short, and the first snow falls in late October. In winter, strong northwesterlies often bring winds over 20 m/s at sea and on the coast, with waves over 5 m. For about half the year, winds whip up ground blizzards (地吹雪) that disrupt traffic.¹ The 1991–2020 normals, from south to north:
  • Rumoi: annual mean 8.0 °C (January −4.1 °C, August 20.9 °C), 1,154.1 mm of precipitation, 546 cm of snowfall and a normal deepest snow cover of 90 cm²⁵
  • Haboro: annual mean 8.0 °C (January −4.3 °C, August 20.9 °C), 1,337.7 mm of precipitation, 535 cm of snowfall and a normal deepest snow cover of 99 cm²⁶
  • Teshio: annual mean 6.8 °C (January −5.4 °C, August 19.5 °C) and 915.4 mm of precipitation, with 219 cm of snowfall in January alone²⁷

• Early peoples: The Kawaguchi site (川口遺跡) in Teshio has 230 pit dwellings spread along a dune beside the Teshio River, over an area 1.5 km long. They date from the Epi-Jōmon to the Satsumon period, and some belong to the Okhotsk culture.²⁸ Ainu built kotan (villages) at the Teshio river mouth, which the long sand spit made a good harbor, and it became a trading hub.²⁹
• Trading posts: The subprefecture traces its history to 1706, when the Matsumae domain put retainers in charge of salmon fishing at the Mashike post (増毛場所). Around 1789 it assigned the Mashike post to Shimokuni Buzen and the Rumoi, Tomamae and Teshio posts to Matsumae Mitsugu.¹ Merchant contractors followed, among them Suhara Kakubei of Kishū, Murayama Denbei and Date Rin'emon.¹ Mashike dates permanent Japanese settlement from 1751, when Murayama took over the Mashike post.¹³ At Teshio the contract system began in 1786, and trade with the Ainu became more unequal.²⁹
• End of the Edo period: In 1857, on the shogunate's orders, Date Rin'emon cut the Mashike Mountain Road to get around the cliffs between Mashike and Hamamasu.¹⁸ The same year the explorer Matsuura Takeshirō surveyed the Teshio River with Ainu help. His talks with Ainu elders fed into his proposal of the name "Hokkaido".²³
• Teshio Province (1869): The province was created on the 15th day of the 8th month of 1869, with six districts and 46 villages. Until 1871 the Yamaguchi domain ran the Mashike and Rumoi districts, and the Mito domain ran Tomamae, Teshio, Nakagawa and Kamikawa. The 1872 count found 1,576 people.⁹
• The subprefecture: The Mashike Subprefecture (増毛支庁) was set up in November 1897. In September 1914 its office moved to the town of Rumoi, and it was renamed the Rumoi Subprefecture (留萌支庁).¹ Kamikawa District had already passed to the Kamikawa office in 1899, and Nakagawa District followed in 1901.⁸
• Herring: The Saga family fished for herring at Reuke, in today's Rumoi, for 113 years until 1957.¹² The Hanada family, whose lodge in Obira was built around 1905, employed more than 200 people.¹² Herring later vanished from the coast, but the lodges and the culture around them survive.³⁰
• Railways: The line from Fukagawa reached Rumoi in 1910 and was extended to Mashike in 1921. A coastal line north opened to Ōtodo in 1927 and to Onishika in 1928.³¹ It became the Haboro Line, which was completed on 18 October 1958 when the last gap, between Shosanbetsu and Enbetsu, was closed. It ran 141.1 km from Rumoi to Horonobe.³²³³
• 1945: On 22 August 1945, a week after Japan's surrender, Soviet submarines attacked three ships carrying evacuees from Sakhalin off Rumoi. The Ogasawara Maru and Taitō Maru sank and the Daini Shinkō Maru was badly damaged. More than 1,708 people died or went missing. Stalin had planned a landing at Rumoi for 24 August, as part of a plan to occupy northern Hokkaido, but no landing took place.³⁴ Memorials stand in Rumoi, Mashike and Obira.³⁴
• Boundary changes: Toyotomi Village was moved to the Soya Subprefecture in October 1948.¹
• Decline: The Haboro Line closed on 30 March 1987.³² The subprefecture's population, about 130,000 at its peak, had fallen to 43,050 by 2020.⁵
• The 2010 reorganization: Hokkaido's ordinance to regroup the 14 subprefectures into 9 general bureaus and 5 bureaus would have made Rumoi a subordinate office of a "Dōhoku General Subprefectural Bureau" (道北総合振興局), formed from Kamikawa. After protests against this "downgrade", the ordinance was amended in March 2009.⁸ In April 2010 the Rumoi Subprefecture became the Rumoi Subprefectural Bureau (留萌振興局), one of five non-general bureaus, and Horonobe was transferred to Soya.¹³⁵
• Roads and rail since 2010:
  • The Rumoi–Mashike rail section closed on 5 December 2016, and the Ishikari-Numata–Rumoi section on 1 April 2023. The rest of the Rumoi Main Line closed on 1 April 2026.³¹ No railway has run in the subprefecture since 2023. Hidaka and Hiyama are the only other subprefectures without one.⁸
  • The Fukagawa-Rumoi Expressway (49 km) was begun in 1989 and opened throughout on 28 March 2020.³³
  • In June 2021, Michi-no-Eki Teshio was among the first stations the national government chose as "disaster-prevention roadside stations" (防災道の駅).³⁶
• Heritage work: The subprefecture and the NPO Mashike Sandō no Kai began restoring the Mashike Mountain Road in fiscal 2009. The whole 27 km route from Hamamasu to Mashike (32 km with the Iwao branch) was reopened in October 2016.¹⁸
• 2026: Rumoi hosts the 14th National Michi-no-Eki Symposium at the Rumoi Culture Center. It comes with a Michi-no-Eki Festival at Michi-no-Eki Rumoi on 3 October 2026, where about 30 stations, mostly from Hokkaido, sell their products.³⁷

• Structure: At the 2020 Census the subprefecture had 21,678 workers. Primary industry employed 16.2% of them, against 6.7% for Hokkaido, and fishing alone 6.4%, against 1.2%. Secondary industry employed 17.7% and services 65.8%.³⁸
• Farming:²²
  • The subprefecture had 25,600 ha of farmland in 2024, 8,400 ha of it paddy.
  • Farm output has been about ¥18 billion a year in recent years, and livestock makes up about 60% of it.
  • Rice covered 3,810 ha in 2024 and yielded 21,800 t. Crops are grown mainly from Enbetsu south, and the region's ordinary rice is rated among the best-tasting in Hokkaido. Its share of low-protein rice is higher than the Hokkaido average.
  • The extra-hard wheat Ruru Rosso is grown only in Obira and Rumoi in Japan. Fresh pasta made from it has been certified as a Hokkaido high-grade food (北のハイグレード食品).
  • Mashike is the center of a fruit district at the northern limit of fruit growing, with apples, cherries, pears and grapes.
  • Teshio and Enbetsu are the center of large-scale dairy farming on grassland. The subprefecture produced 61,275 t of raw milk in 2023.
  • There were 664 farm businesses in 2020, and 43% of farm workers were 65 or older.
• Fisheries:³⁹²
  • Coastal boats farm scallops and raise scallop seed, and work gill nets, salmon set nets and octopus pots. Offshore, on rich grounds such as the Musashi Bank (武蔵堆), boats catch shrimp and cod.
  • The 2024 catch was 26,091 t, worth ¥13.8 billion. Scallop seed and half-grown scallops brought in ¥5.2 billion of that.
  • Shrimp brought in ¥1.84 billion, or 51.3% of Hokkaido's shrimp catch by value, the largest share of any subprefecture.
  • Rumoi's herring catch was the second-largest in Hokkaido by value (¥640 million, 18.6%), and its flounder (hirame) catch the third-largest (14.6%). Octopus brought in ¥1.42 billion (9.4%).
  • Shijimi clams, from Teshio, brought in ¥48 million.
  • The subprefecture is releasing herring, flounder and salmon fry to rebuild stocks. It had 510 fishing cooperative members and 756 fishing boats in 2024.
• Forestry: Much of the forest is 41–45 years old and has reached harvesting age. In fiscal 2022 about 80,000 ha of forest in the region gained SGEC/PEFC certification.²⁴
• Port:⁴⁰
  • Rumoi Port is a nationally designated Important Port and an international trade port. It serves as the distribution port for Kamikawa, Rumoi and Sorachi, including Asahikawa.
  • Its deepest berth, the −12 m quay at Sandomari, takes ships of 30,000 deadweight tons and is built to withstand earthquakes.
  • In 2025 the port handled 795,000 t of cargo. Most of it was domestic cargo coming in (613,000 t), mainly petroleum products (493,000 t) and cement. Imports came to 125,000 t, mostly coal. Timber has been exported to China and South Korea since 2014.
  • The subprefecture also has five local ports: Mashike, Haboro, Teuri, Yagishiri and Teshio.
• Industry and commerce: In 2024 there were 71 plants employing 1,448 people, which shipped ¥30.3 billion of goods. The 2021 Economic Census counted 523 shops, with ¥62.5 billion of sales, only 0.4% of Hokkaido's total. The subprefecture says spending flows out to Sapporo and Asahikawa.⁴¹
• Wind power: The strong winter northwesterlies made the coast one of the first places in Japan to run wind farms. In February 2026 the subprefecture had 22 large turbines with a total output of 66,110 kW, about 5.2% of Hokkaido's wind capacity and 1.0% of Japan's. The largest farms are at Kamihira in Tomamae: eight turbines of 30,600 kW, running since October 2023, and five of 20,000 kW, since March 2022. Older turbines are being replaced with larger ones.¹⁵
• Regional strategy: Hokkaido's plan for the area, which runs for about five years from April 2025, includes projects on food and nature to build ties with people outside the region, and a "Zero Carbon Rumoi" project. The zero-carbon project covers renewable energy, blue carbon for fisheries, "Rumoi-style smart farming" and wood biomass.⁴²

Regional brands and specialties

Festival calendar (selected, 2026–27)

All dates are from the subprefecture's event calendar. It warns that dates can change and events can be cancelled.⁴⁴

Hokkaido Heritage: Four of Hokkaido's 74 Hokkaido Heritage items are sites in the subprefecture, not counting statewide themes.⁴⁵

• The Rumoi Herring Road (留萌のニシン街道), from the first round. It covers the Former Saga Family Fishery and the Umi no Furusato-kan museum in Rumoi, the Former Hanada Family Banya in Obira, and the Okada family lodge in Tomamae. The Okada lodge was pulled down in 2014 because it had decayed, and its fishing gear is now shown at the Tomamae town museum.⁴⁵³⁰
• The historic buildings of Mashike (増毛の歴史的建物群), also from the first round.⁴⁵
• The Teshio River, from the second round (2004).⁴⁵²³
• The Mashike and Gokibiru mountain roads (増毛山道と濃昼山道), from the third round, selected in November 2018.⁴⁵¹⁸

Historic buildings:¹²

• The streets around the former Mashike Station are lined with old buildings, headed by the Former Merchant House Maruichi Honma. The subprefecture calls them almost the only historic townscape left in northern Hokkaido. The Honma house became a national Important Cultural Property in 2003.
• The subprefecture calls the old Mashike Elementary School Hokkaido's oldest wooden school building. It was used as a school until March 2012 and opens to the public during events.
• The Former Saga Family Fishery in Rumoi became a National Historic Site in 1997. Its herring-fishing tools became a national Important Tangible Folk Cultural Property in 1995.
• The Former Hanada Family Banya in Obira became a national Important Cultural Property in 1971.

International ties: Rumoi has been a sister city of Ulan-Ude in Buryatia, Russia, since 1972, and Rumoi Port a friendship port of Yingkou, China, since 1990. Teshio is twinned with Homer, Alaska (1984), and Enbetsu with Castlegar, British Columbia (1989).⁴⁶

Ainu heritage

• Place names: All eight municipality names come from Ainu, according to the subprefecture:¹⁰

  • Rumoi, from Rurumoppe, "quiet river"
  • Mashike, from Mashikei, "place with many gulls"
  • Obira, from Opiraushipetsu, "place with a cliff at the river mouth"
  • Tomamae, from Tomaomanai, "place where Ezo-engosaku grows"
  • Haboro, from Haporopetsu, "great flowing river"
  • Shosanbetsu, from Soesanpetsu, "river where a waterfall flows out"
  • Enbetsu, from Uiepetsu, "river where people talk together"
  • Teshio, from teshu, a fish weir

  Other readings exist for several of these, and each municipality's file sets them out.

• Trade and contact: In the Edo period the coast was divided into trading posts (basho) under the Matsumae domain and its merchant contractors (see History).¹ In Teshio, an Ainu man called Shikarakande taught the Ainu language to the wasan mathematician Kushihara Uchū in a language exchange.²⁹

• Matsuura Takeshirō: Ainu guides and elders helped Matsuura on his 1857 survey of the Teshio River. The survey fed into his Teshio Diary and the naming of Hokkaido.²³

• Archaeology: The Kawaguchi site in Teshio has reconstructed pit dwellings in the Kawaguchi Site Scenic Forest, open from 1 May to 31 October. Some of its finds are kept at the Teshio River History Museum.²⁸

• Today: The Ainu Association of Hokkaido has no local branch in Rumoi. The nearest listed are the Toyotomi association in Toyotomi, Soya, and the Asahikawa and Kamikawa (上川) associations in the Kamikawa area.⁴⁷ The municipality files found few written records of Ainu communities in individual towns and no dedicated Ainu cultural facility in the subprefecture.

• Visitor numbers: The subprefecture counted 1,831,200 tourist visits in FY2025, almost the same as the year before (99.8%).⁴⁸
  • 91.5% of visits were by people from within Hokkaido.
  • 93.1% were day trips, and overnight guests numbered 127,000.
  • August was the busiest month, with 364,000 visits.
  • Foreign overnight guests numbered 1,356, with 1,708 guest-nights, up 32% on the year before. The largest group came from China.
  • In FY2024 the subprefecture's 1.84 million visits were 1.2% of Hokkaido's total.²
• By municipality (FY2025): Rumoi had 445,700 visits, Teshio 433,600, Mashike 357,800, Enbetsu 165,500, Tomamae 160,900, Obira 158,500, Shosanbetsu 64,400 and Haboro 44,800.⁴⁸ The survey counts towns and sites differently. Haboro's town total, for example, is lower than its count for the Sunset Plaza alone.
• Busiest sites (FY2025): Michi-no-Eki Rumoi had 388,200 visitors and Michi-no-Eki Teshio 347,700. Michi-no-Eki Enbetsu Fujimi had 170,800, Tomamae Onsen Fuwatto 160,500, the Kunimare brewery 131,900, Haboro Onsen Sunset Plaza 91,900, Michi-no-Eki Obira Nishin Banya 79,900 and the Misaki-no-Yu hot spring in Shosanbetsu 33,000.⁴⁸
• Herring heritage: Visit the Saga fishery in Rumoi, the Hanada banya in Obira and the historic streets of Mashike (see Culture).¹²
• Seabirds and islands: Rhinoceros auklets return to their burrows on Teuri from March to late July.³ The yew forest and sheep pastures of Yagishiri have walking paths.¹⁸
• Mountains and coast: Alpine flowers bloom on Mt. Shokanbetsu, and the sea cliffs of the Ofuyu coast line the south. Along the restored Mashike Mountain Road are Meiji-era telegraph poles, the site of the Buyoshi relay station and old stone bridge footings.¹⁸ See Mashike for guided treks.
• Stars and sunsets: The village of Shosanbetsu calls its observatory Japan's northernmost. Its 65 cm Cassegrain reflector was installed in 1989, 46 m above sea level.¹⁹²⁰
• Northern limits: Enbetsu's paddy fields at 44°45′N are Japan's northernmost, according to the town, which thinks they may be the world's northernmost paddy rice.²¹
• The Sankebetsu bear attack: On 9 and 10 December 1915, a 380 kg brown bear that had missed hibernation killed seven people and badly injured three at a pioneer settlement in Tomamae. The town calls it the worst tragedy in the history of animal attacks. The hunter Yamamoto Heikichi shot the bear on 14 December.¹⁶ A reconstruction of the scene stands in the forest (see Tomamae).
• Beaches: The subprefecture lists swimming beaches in six municipalities, open from early July to mid-August.⁴⁹ Golden Beach Rumoi, 1,000 m wide, is one of the largest artificial swimming beaches in northern Hokkaido.⁴⁴
• Cycling: The Orolon Line Cycle Route, the ninth designated cycle route in Hokkaido, runs 145.4 km from Mashike to Teshio through all eight municipalities.⁵⁰ In 2026 a digital stamp rally ran along the route and its campgrounds from 4 July to 23 September.⁵¹
• Getting information: The Rumoi Tourism League promotes the region as "Hokkaido no Hidari-ue" (北海道の左上, "the top left of Hokkaido") on its outdoor portal site.⁵¹ The subprefecture's food and tourism pages link to a guide to local products, a fish-shop map and orchard information.⁵²

Suggested routes

1. Herring coast, Sapporo to Obira (1–2 days):
   • Drive north from Sapporo on Route 231 along the Ofuyu coast. Sapporo to Mashike is about 115 km, about 2 h 30 min.⁵³
   • In Mashike, walk the station-front street, see the Honma house and try sake at Kunimare (tours free, 9:00–16:30).¹²⁴³
   • In Rumoi, stop at Michi-no-Eki Rumoi and watch the sunset at Ogon Cape.¹⁰ Check Rumoi for the Saga fishery's opening season before you go.
   • Continue to Michi-no-Eki Obira Nishin Banya in Obira for the Hanada banya and a herring oyako-don.¹⁴
   • To return, the Fukagawa-Rumoi Expressway takes about 1 h 50 min from Rumoi IC to Sapporo.⁵³
2. Wind, seabirds and islands (2 days):
   • Bathe at Tomamae Onsen Fuwatto in Tomamae and see the Kamihira wind farm.¹⁷¹⁵
   • From Haboro, take the ferry to Yagishiri and Teuri. The high-speed boat takes about 35 minutes to Yagishiri and 60 minutes to Teuri.⁵³
   • Watch the auklets return on Teuri, walk the yew forest on Yagishiri, and visit the Hokkaido Seabird Center on the mainland.³¹⁸¹⁰
3. The northern Orolon Line, Haboro to Wakkanai (1 day):
   • Drive north on Route 232 to Shosanbetsu for the observatory and the hot spring at Misaki-dai Park.⁵⁴
   • In Enbetsu, visit the northernmost paddy fields and Michi-no-Eki Enbetsu Fujimi, with Rishiri Fuji across the sea on clear days.²¹⁵⁵
   • In Teshio, have shijimi ramen at Michi-no-Eki Teshio and see the Kawaguchi site.⁵⁶²⁸
   • Continue on Hokkaido Road 106 to Wakkanai, about 68 km and 1 h 10 min from Teshio.⁵³

Seven of Hokkaido's 128 active Michi-no-Eki are in the subprefecture. The official list numbers stations up to 131, but three have been deregistered. The seven are listed here from south to north.⁵⁷ Visitor figures are for FY2025.⁴⁸

Mashike has no Michi-no-Eki.⁵⁷ Its file suggests stops near the old station instead.

• Rail: No trains run in the subprefecture.⁸ The last section, from Ishikari-Numata to Rumoi, closed on 1 April 2023, and the rest of the Rumoi Main Line, to Fukagawa, on 1 April 2026.³¹ Buses run south to Sapporo, Asahikawa and Fukagawa, and north through Horonobe to Toyotomi in Soya.³³⁶⁰
• Roads:³³
  • National Route 231 (Sapporo–Rumoi), Route 232 (Rumoi–Wakkanai) and Hokkaido Road 106 (Wakkanai–Teshio) run along the coast and form the "Japan Sea Orolon Line" touring route.
  • The Fukagawa-Rumoi Expressway (49 km) links Fukagawa and Rumoi. Route 233 also runs inland toward Fukagawa and Asahikawa, and Route 239 crosses the Teshio Mountains from Tomamae toward Shibetsu.
• Driving times (Rumoi Tourism League):⁵³
  • Sapporo to Mashike: about 115 km and 2 h 30 min by Route 231
  • Sapporo to Rumoi: about 148 km and 1 h 50 min by expressway, or about 142 km and 2 h 40 min by Routes 275 and 233
  • New Chitose Airport to Rumoi: about 160 km and 2 h 10 min by expressway
  • Asahikawa to Rumoi: about 86 km and 1 h 10 min by expressway
  • Wakkanai to Teshio: about 68 km and 1 h 10 min by Hokkaido Road 106
• Express buses: Book ahead, since the Engan Bus expresses run by reservation only.⁶⁰
  • Engan Bus's Tokkyū Haboro (特急はぼろ号) leaves Sapporo Station (stop 32) four times a day and runs up the coast through Rumoi, Obira, Tomamae and Haboro. Three buses continue through Shosanbetsu, Enbetsu, Teshio and Horonobe to Toyotomi.⁶⁰
  • On the timetable from 1 October 2026, the 13:00 from Sapporo reaches Rumoi (Kasuga-chō 1-chōme) at 15:29, Haboro Terminal at 16:21 and Teshio at 17:34.⁶⁰
  • Cash fares from Sapporo are ¥2,800 to Rumoi, ¥4,700 to Haboro and ¥6,300 to Teshio.⁶⁰
  • From 1 October 2026 the bus also stops at Rumoi Station-mae (留萌駅前) and Rumoi Gōdō Chōsha-mae (留萌合同庁舎前).⁶⁰
  • Engan Bus also runs the Tokkyū Mashike from Sapporo on set days, and a Haboro–Asahikawa bus via Rumoi.³³⁶⁰
  • Chūō Bus runs five buses a day between Rumoi and Sapporo, three via Fukagawa and two via Takikawa. Engan Bus and Dōhoku Bus jointly run five rapid buses a day between Rumoi and Asahikawa.³³
• Local buses: Engan Bus's "Moekko Free Kippu" gives unlimited rides for one or two days on its routes from Mashike to Teshio, and on to Horonobe and Toyotomi. It also takes 10% off the regular fare on the Haboro–Teuri ferry and high-speed boat.⁵³
• Ferry: Haboro Enkai Ferry sails from Haboro to Yagishiri and Teuri.³³
  • The high-speed boat takes about 35 minutes to Yagishiri and 60 minutes to Teuri, and the car ferry about 60 and 90 minutes.⁵³
  • The high-speed boat Sanrainā 2 (さんらいなぁ2) entered service in April 2013 and runs from April to August, the busy tourist months.³³
  • The route carried 27,053 passengers in 2025, 8,006 of them in August.³³
  • A connecting bus runs from Engan Bus's head-office terminal in Haboro to the ferry terminal.⁵³
• Airports: New Chitose Airport is about 160 km from Rumoi, or about 2 h 10 min by expressway. In the north, central Wakkanai is about 68 km from Teshio.⁵³
• Getting around: A car is the easiest way to link the towns and the sights between them. Cyclists can follow the Orolon Line Cycle Route.⁵⁰ In winter, ground blizzards often disrupt traffic, so check road reports before driving.¹