Asahikawa 旭川市, Hokkaido Prefecture

Asahikawa (Japanese: 旭川市) is a city in Kamikawa subprefecture, in Hokkaido, Japan. It covers 747.6 sq km (288.6 sq mi) and has a population of 352,000 people (2012 estimate).

Asahikawa was named after the river flowing through it. The word Asahi means "morning sun" The name was supposed to be a translation of the Ainu word for it, Chiu Pet, which means "river of waves". It was instead misinterpreted as Chup Pet, meaning "sun river".

The city of Asahikawa was founded on 1 August, 1922. It was a military base during the Second World War. Today the city hosts the annual Asahikawa Winter Festival. It has a number of culinary specialities including the Asahikawa ramen, various local sake and a local mutton barbecue dish.

Asahikawa City, Hokkaido

Planning your trip to Asahikawa

There are flights from major cities in Japan to the Asahikawa Airport (AKJ). The city is also the terminus of the JR Hakodate Main Line connecting it with Sapporo, Otaru and Hakodate.

Sights & Attractions to visit in Asahikawa

Asahikawa Museum of Sculpture

 Latest updates on Penang Travel Tips

Map of Roads in Penang

Looking for information on Penang? Use this Map of Roads in Penang to zoom in on information about Penang, brought to you road by road.

About this website

Dear visitor, thank you so much for reading this page. My name is Timothy Tye and my hobby is to find out about places, write about them and share the information with you on this website. I have been writing this site since 5 January 2003. Originally (from 2003 until 2009, the site was called AsiaExplorers. I changed the name to Penang Travel Tips in 2009, even though I describe more than just Penang but everywhere I go (I often need to tell people that "Penang Travel Tips" is not just information about Penang, but information written in Penang), especially places in Malaysia and Singapore, and in all the years since 2003, I have described over 20,000 places.

While I try my best to provide you information as accurate as I can get it to be, I do apologize for any errors and for outdated information which I am unaware. Nevertheless, I hope that what I have described here will be useful to you.