ana's japan destination guide

kanji		Like Sapporo, the name of this city
is clearly Ainu. It is an abbreviation of yanuwakkanai, meaning "stream with cold water." The characters (wakka = "very young"; nai = "inside") are used for their phonetic value, not their meanings.
map
Total Area
Wakkanai City: 765 km2
Hokkaido Pref.: 83,520 km2

Population
Wakkanai City: ~ 45,000
Hokkaido Pref.: ~ 5,727,500

Major Industries
Fishing
Dairy farming
Tourism
Construction 		Major Products
Kelp
Fish, shellfish
Fish products
Beef
Geography
Wakkanai, the northernmost city in the Japanese archipelago, faces the Sea of Okhotsk to the east, the Japan Sea to the west, and the Soya Straight to the north. It is also a border town, overlooking Russia's Sakhalin, 43 kilometers from Cape Soya.

Climate
Spring arrives very late here. Following the short summer, the district suffers fierce Arctic winds and heavy snowfalls. Annual temperature average: 17°C (May to Oct.), 1.3°C (Nov. to April).


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© All Nippon Airways. Produced by McEdit.
Portions originally appeared in the Jun '99 issue of WINGSPAN, the inflight magazine of ANA.