Mount Apoi Geopark Visitor Center was added to Your Favorites!
Hidakasanmyaku Erimo Tokachi NP, Hokkaido
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Mt. Apoi is only 810 m high yet supports about 80 alpine plant species, with nearly 20 endemic kinds. The center’s 4-m diorama recreates its flower-rich Uma-no-se ridge; peridotite soil and sea fog help keep forests at bay.
The center projects Ainu place names onto a relief model of Samani, alongside its geology. Ainu legends also appear in the exhibits, connecting the names and stories to the actual landscape.
The center screens Samani Ainu culture, including local cooking and classical dance. In 2025 it added a 39-minute film of the local preservation society performing; Ainu traditional dance was inscribed on UNESCO’s heritage list in 2009.
When the center reopened in 2013, 3 peridotite researchers donated 23 real samples from around the world. The collection gave visitors a global comparison for the mantle rock that makes Mt. Apoi distinctive.
One display is a fault-surface peel from a branch of the Hidaka Main Thrust, part of the ancient collision zone between eastern and western Hokkaido—a piece of the region’s tectonic story brought inside.
After Samani’s October 2023 torrential rain, the center’s team investigated a collapsed cliff, collected rock specimens and photographed the damage. Some of that fieldwork became a display—local geology recorded as it happens.
In 2013, the old mountain visitor center grew from about 140 m² to roughly 500 m². Its expanded exhibits widened the focus from hiking, rocks and flowers to Samani’s geology, nature, history and industries.
Samani Town Library supplies books for a small reading corner at the center, changing the selection every 2 months. Picture books welcome children, while campers and people waiting for climbers can browse too.
The center added a display of the Japanese paper umbrella called a bangasa after a local umbrella-decoration workshop drew interest from people who had not even taken part. Now visitors can see one whenever they drop in.
