Northeast Hokkaido · AbashiriNo.1124★★Open in map →
Drift Ice Icebreaker Aurora
— Abashiri's winter run into the Okhotsk pack ice
A sightseeing icebreaker that works the pack ice off Abashiri in deep winter, leaving from the roadside station at the mouth of the Abashiri River. It rides up onto the floes and breaks them with the weight of the hull.
- FromAbashiri Station (JR Sekihoku and Senmo Main Lines)
- ~25 minWinter only, bus or a walk from JR Abashiri
- Drift Ice Icebreaker Aurora
The sweet spot
Nothing here is undiscovered — this is the headline winter attraction of the Okhotsk coast and the sailings fill. What thins it out is that the season is short and the ice keeps no timetable. The operator resets the sailing dates each year around when the floes actually arrive, and rough weather cancels departures outright.
Where it is
102 more notes in Hokkaido · open the map →What to look for — in walking order
- Michi-no-Eki Ryuhyo Kaido Abashirithe roadside station on the river mouth, with 106 car spaces and the ticket desk
- The ground-floor counterstourist information, an Okhotsk produce shop and a takeaway corner
- The upstairs view decka look out over the river mouth to the Okhotsk Sea and the Shiretoko Peninsula
- The quaythe berth on the Abashiri River where the ship loads in winter
- The bowthe shaped forward hull that climbs a floe before the weight does the rest
How to actually get there
- Abashiri Station → the port, by bus from the station stand or on foot down to the waterfront.
- Michi-no-Eki Ryuhyo Kaido Abashiri → buy or collect the ticket at the desk inside.
- Wait at the upstairs view deck, then board from the river frontage when called.
- Return the same way, allowing for the thin winter train service.
- Bus or a walk from JR Abashiri Station
- Abashiri Station is the terminus of both the Sekihoku Main Line and the Senmo Main Line, which makes it the natural gateway. The operator states that buses reach the berth from the bus stands at both Abashiri Station and Memanbetsu Airport. On foot it is a straight run down to the port, with the roadside station signed from the waterfront road.
- Back into town, or on along the coast
- The return is the same short hop. Trains on both lines are thin in winter and vulnerable to weather, so read the next departure before you sail rather than after. The bus back to the station and the airport uses the stand you arrived at, and the ticket hall is the warm place to wait for it.
About the place
The Aurora is 45 metres long and 491 tons, and it carries 3,000 horsepower, well above what a passenger vessel of that size would normally need. It does not cut ice with a blade. The bow is shaped to ride up onto a floe so the hull's own weight cracks it, and ballast tanks take on sea water when more weight is wanted. Inside the ice the ship makes about three knots, roughly walking pace. The reason any of this works off Abashiri is the sea itself: fresh water from the Amur leaves a low-salinity layer sitting on the surface, so the water freezes far more readily than the latitude suggests.
How to enjoy it
A sailing runs about sixty minutes, and the ice conditions decide how much of that is spent in ice rather than open water. The deck is where the ship earns its name and the saloon is where you thaw, so plan on moving between the two rather than choosing one. Out of season the ship does not sail, but the roadside station stays open and remains a fair stop for the view and the produce counter.
Background & history
Abashiri turned its ice from a hazard into a season. The Aurora entered service in January 1991, purpose-built for a job most passenger ships never do. The berth it uses now is younger than the ship: the roadside station on the river mouth was registered in December 2008 and doubles as the boarding hall, which is why the ticket desk sits between a tourist information counter and a souvenir floor. The ice itself is older business — it has been drifting down the east coast of Sakhalin on the East Sakhalin Current for far longer than anyone has sold tickets to see it.
Before you go
- Cash
- Sailings are ticketed and seats are handled through the operator's own booking channels. Fares and the timetable are set per season and published on the official site, so confirm both before travelling. The roadside station has a shop and a takeaway counter, and it has its own car park.
- Before you go
- This is a winter-only sailing. The season is reset each year and tracks the ice, which never arrives on the same date twice, and rough weather cancels departures outright. Outside the season the ship does not run at all, though the roadside station itself stays open.
- Another way
- The other way to meet this ice is to stay ashore. The Okhotsk coast on either side of Abashiri lets you look at the floes without boarding anything. Abashiri also sits where two rail lines meet, so the town works as a base whether or not the ship is sailing.
- After you get off
- From Abashiri Station the port lies downhill and east, and the roadside station stands at the mouth of the Abashiri River where the port road meets the water. That building is the boarding hall, so the ticket desk and the waiting are indoors rather than on the quay. The ship loads from the river frontage directly in front of it.