A Dog Friendly Day Trip To Asahikawa
We’ve recently moved to Hokkaido from the UK with our dog, and finding fun, dog friendly days out that we can all partake in is something we will continue to document on Travel Hokkaido. Our first winter living here had nearly ended, so we went on our first day trip to Asahikawa!
Asahikawa is around 2 hours by car from central Sapporo, it’s the second largest city in Hokkaido after Sapporo, and it was designated a UNESCO Creative City of Design in 2019. There is so much to this city in the north that we couldn’t explore in one day, and the Asahikawa Winter Festival which takes place every February is also a must visit in Hokkaido, along with the well known Sapporo Snow Festival.
Here’s everything we got up to in Asahikawa, along with vintage shopping recommendations and a fab dog friendly restaurant that you must visit if you’re in the area.
A Dog Friendly Day Trip To Asahikawa
Exploring Tokiwa Park
No one does tunnels quite like the Japanese, and after a beautifully scenic drive we stopped at our first destination for the day for a lovely dog walk with Papi. Tokiwa Park is such a peaceful escape, the two rivers were still completely frozen when we visited, but it’s open all year round and is completely free to explore and enjoy.
Every winter, Tokiwa Park becomes part of one of Hokkaido’s biggest seasonal events, the Asahikawa Winter Festival. It is a lesser known festival to tourists than the Sapporo snow festival, but one which deserves more recognition as it is incredible what these artists do.
It is definitely on our list to visit it in 2027!
Walking around Tokiwa park, you will find a beautiful shrine accessed peacefully tucked away. The shrine within Tokiwa Park in Asahikawa, Hokkaido, is commonly associated with Kamikawa Shrine, often referred to locally as a branch site such as Tokiwa Kamikawa Shrine or Kamikawa Shrine Tongu.
Visiting in March, it was even more beautiful as the pond was still completely frozen over. After an hour walk, it was time to get back in the car and find some antique stores to hunt in.
As you may have seen, we recently bought a home in Japan and are beginning renovation work. We also moved to Japan with very little, so scouring antique stores for traditional, vintage items has been a lot of fun so far!
Vintage Home Decor Shopping In Asahikawa
Asahikawa was designated a UNESCO Creative City of Design in 2019, and prior to the trip we did a lot of research about the area and couldn’t believe how many incredible vintage, antique stores they had, and they are all over the city!
We’ve really enjoyed antiques hunting in Sapporo, but this really seemed like next level shopping with the variety and choice, and we had a few stores from the day saved to look at.
I’ve listed the two stores that we featured in the images below, because if you’re ever in Asahikawa, you need to add them to your itinerary. When I say that the shops were stuffed to the gills with stuff, it would be an understatement. Every type of ceramic you could think of, war memorabilia, vases, furniture – this was my wife’s idea of heaven!
Just remember to bring cash, as most of these stores don’t accept card. Come with an idea of what you’re looking for, but do be prepared to come away with more than you initially thought…
We got a range of ceramics and a very cool art print of Sapporo station from these stores, we share everything we picked up on our YouTube video further down!
Dog Friendly Venison Restaurant
After a morning of shopping, we took a short drive out onto the outskirts of Asahikawa, it was so vast, and we saw a lot of abandoned homes on the drive. That’s the sad thing about a lot of rural Japan, as so many over the years have left and gone to the bigger cities, leaving the countryside desolate and abandoned. Hopefully in time, with a wave of new people we can start to see these once abandoned towns full of life again.
We found Venison Restaurant Sankei which was also dog friendly, but you don’t need to have a dog to visit as they have a separate eating area for those without dogs. If you do bring a dog, you need to bring all of your rabies and vaccination certificates to register them as you arrive. It did take us around 15 minutes and felt a bit cumbersome, but we also understand why they do it here in Japan. Although, this is our first experience like this when visiting a dog friendly cafe in Japan.
They also have a dog run on site which cost ¥800 to use, this gives dogs an opportunity to be let off lead in a gated area, although we didn’t use it this time as Papi was exhausted from his morning walk!
So, the food. We got a Venison deconstructed cheese burger with rice, salad and Nicole had a hamburger with fries. They also offer a number of food items for your dog and Papi got to enjoy some venison with rice for lunch.
We really enjoyed the food and the prices seemed reasonable, we were the only ones eating here so it was very relaxed, and Papi was left undisturbed. Would we go back? Now we have registered Papi there it would be easier, so if we were in the area we probably would, but equally, we always like to try new places so we can share our experience with you!
After a late lunch, we had a few other vintage stores saved but none were open! During winter we have experienced that many businesses choose to shut during this season, and some businesses do shut on a Monday anyway, so just something to bear in mind.
However, from what we experienced so far of Asahikawa, it’s a great city with a lot to offer, next time we hope to explore the town and the Clark Horse Garden that has been recommended to us, do let us know in the comments below if you have any other recommendations!
We finished our drive home with a stop at an infamous michi-no-eki (roadside station) and grabbed a Hokkaido milk soft serve, there’s no such thing as it being too cold for an ice cream in Hokkaido, right?!
