9 Best Sights in Sapporo, Hokkaido

Follow the long gravel paths under Maruyama Park's tall cypress trees until you come to the main gate of what looks like a fortress. Before entering, wash your hands and rinse your mouth at the stone basin, then climb the stone steps to Hokkaido's loveliest Shinto shrine. Hokkaido Jingu, originally built in 1871, honors the gods of land and nature, of land development, and of healing. To this day, families with babies, anxious students facing exams, and young engaged couples seek blessings under Shinto ceremonies. In May this is the city's main viewing spot for cherry blossoms, and as the year comes to a close it's coin-tossing central for those wishing for a better future.

Stretching for more than a mile through the center of the city, Odori Park is one of the defining landmarks of Sapporo. Buy roasted corn on the cob and potatoes from food vendors and feast on them as you watch the skateboarders and street performers. In winter, enjoy the famous Sapporo Snow Festival with its massive snow sculptures. There's the energetic and loud Yosokoi Soran Festival every spring, and for three weeks in July and August the park hosts a bacchanal called the Sapporo Beer Festival. Every block becomes a biergarten for a major Japanese beer manufacturer (the foreign and microbrews, naturally, are the farthest walk away), with Sapporo Beer smack in the middle of it all. Last orders at 9 pm, then everyone stumbles home or out for more partying in Susukino. Not to be missed if you're in town.

With more than 5,000 plant varieties, these gardens are a cool summer retreat. Highlights include a small Northern Peoples Museum with a grisly but fascinating 13-minute film of an Ainu bear-killing ceremony in Asahikawa in 1935, and a stuffed husky sharing a room with bears and an Ezo wolf. This glassy-eyed hound in Hokkaido's oldest museum in the center of the park is Taro, one of the canine survivors abandoned in a 1958 Antarctic expedition—a story brought to non-Japanese audiences in the Disney movie Eight Below (2006). After his ordeal, Taro retired to Hokkaido University, died in 1970, and remains here in dusty, shaggy glory.

Step back into 19th-century Hokkaido and see the herring-fleet dormitory, where 60 fishermen appear to have just folded up their futons and left for a day's work, or the village clinic where a Dr. Kondo seems to have vanished, leaving his scary-looking birthing table and books behind. It's easy to spend a few hours walking in and out of 60 historic homes, shops, farms, and offices brought here from all over Hokkaido. This park museum very effectively depicts how ordinary Japanese lived and worked under Japan's policy to develop Ezo into Hokkaido before the Russians could. You can ride down the main street in a horse-drawn trolley (in summer) or sleigh (in winter). Ask for the excellent free English guide at the ticket counter.

From woolly mammoth molars to bulky 1950s home electronics, the history of Hokkaido is meticulously exhibited here in glass-topped cases—it's all a tad dry compared to the vivid history lesson at the nearby Hokkaido Historical Village, but much more thorough. The building houses an overview of Hokkaido's natural history, how Meiji-era Japan realized that this northern island had coal, fish, and agricultural opportunities ripe for the picking, and also portrays Hokkaido's story in modern times in a newly renovated building. Basic audio guides are available in English.

This green oasis is a 10-minute walk beyond Susukino's lights and contains Hoheikan, a white-and-blue Russian-influenced 19th-century imperial guesthouse; Hasso-an Teahouse, an Edo-era teahouse moved here in 1919 and located in a Japanese garden; a boating lake; and the Kitara concert hall, home of the Pacific Music Festival, started in 1990 by Leonard Bernstein. It's a pleasant stroll during the day.

Quaint brick buildings adjacent to a giant shopping mall make up the public face of Sapporo's most famous export. Here you'll find a small museum with signage mostly in Japanese that reveals the development of bottle and label designs and depicts decades of cheesecake shots from advertising posters.

Pick up an English-language guide at the counter for explanations of all the different things on display in the museum.

For ¥300 you can taste any of the brews: Black Label is most popular, but the Classic and Kaitoku are only available in Hokkaido. Taste all three for ¥800. Also available are tea and soft drinks for ¥100.

In the evening the cavernous Sapporo Biergarten is filled with serious drinkers tackling the tabe-nomi-hodai (all-you-can-eat-and-drink) feast of lamb barbecue and beer (about ¥4,400 per person). The catch: You have to finish within 100 minutes. To get here, take a 15-minute Factory Line circular bus from the train station. It's a ¥1,000 taxi ride.

For millions of Japanese, this little white-clapboard Russian-style meetinghouse defines Sapporo. Built in 1878 as the drill hall for students of Sapporo Agricultural College (now Hokkaido University), it has become the city's symbol on souvenir packaging. A bit underwhelming, Tokeidai contains photographs and documents telling the region's history and a clock from Boston.

Leap off a ski jump into the freezing air and land like a pro—or not. In this museum at the base of the Olympic Okura Jump, a realistic simulator lets you comparing jump distances. The 1972 Winter Olympics and other Japanese sporting successes in skating, curling, and many forms of skiing are celebrated with displays interesting even to nonsporting types. Outside the museum, take the chairlift to the top of the real ski jump for a chilling view of what athletes face before takeoff. From the Maruyama Koen Subway Station it is a 10-minute taxi ride, or take Bus No. 14 from Maruyama Bus Terminal to Okurayama Kyogijyo Iriguchi bus stop (10 minutes) then walk a further 10 minutes. Sapporo hopes to host the 2030 Winter Olympics, which will bring more attention to the island's great resorts.