Skip to content
viewyas
EN

Japan Japan observation deck

Rausu Kunashiri Observation Tower

You can see 94 km from here, looking north-east.

Calculating the panorama…

Drag to turn around. The relief is drawn 2.2 times taller so the ridges can be read; far ridges are paler, as in the real air.

The view

Up to 94 km away.

Calculated on the relief one degree at a time, up to 250 km, with the curvature of the Earth and the refraction of the air: what stands above the horizon from here.

67out of 100

Our own rating, from the relief and the climate only: open horizon (35 points), how far you see (25), sea and named peaks in view (20) and clear months (20).

  • 94 kmFarthest ridgelooking north-east
  • 96%Open horizonof the circle where the horizon is below your eyes
  • 11%Seaof the circle where the horizon is the sea
  • 25Peaks in viewnamed summits that rise above the relief in front
  • 154 mAltitudeabove the sea, at the highest point of the viewpoint

The 25 peaks you can name from here

From west to east as you turn around: height, distance and direction. Each one links to its guide on Peakyas, our mountain atlas.

Smirnov1,486 m · 88 km · north-eastTyatya1,819 m · 93 km · north-eastBerutarube1,223 m · 148 km · eastMendeleyeva888 m · 44 km · eastGolovnin543 m · 32 km · south-eastMount Toride19 m · 42 km · southMount Maru205 m · 125 km · southMusa-dake1,005 m · 45 km · south-westMount Kutekunbetsu995 m · 46 km · south-westMount Kumbetsu699 m · 29 km · south-westMount Unabetsu1,419 m · 30 km · south-westMount Rausu1,660 m · 8.4 km · north-westMount Mitsumine1,509 m · 8.8 km · north-westMount Sashirui1,564 m · 9.5 km · northMount Okkabake1,462 m · 10 km · northMount Minami1,459 m · 11 km · northMount Chienbetsu1,544 m · 12 km · northMount Eirei521 m · 2.5 km · north

From the relief only: buildings, trees and haze are not in the model. On a hazy day you see much less; 250 km is the limit of our calculation.

The sun

The best sunsets are from September to October.

When the sun really disappears from this viewpoint — behind the relief or into the sea — and in which direction, on the 15th of each month, in local time.

  1. Jansouth-west20 min before the sea-level sunset9%
  2. Febwest20 min before the sea-level sunset18%
  3. Marwest32 min before the sea-level sunset23%
  4. Aprwest40 min before the sea-level sunset26%
  5. Maywest44 min before the sea-level sunset22%
  6. Junnorth-west50 min before the sea-level sunset22%
  7. Julnorth-west46 min before the sea-level sunset22%
  8. Augwest46 min before the sea-level sunset21%
  9. Sepwest32 min before the sea-level sunset30%
  10. Octwest26 min before the sea-level sunset32%
  11. Novsouth-west18 min before the sea-level sunset19%
  12. Decsouth-west20 min before the sea-level sunset10%
  • Time: when the sun goes behind the horizon you see from here.
  • Minutes: how much earlier the relief hides the sun.
  • %: share of clear sky that month (NASA, 2001–2020).

The highlighted months are the clearest. Golden hour starts about an hour before.

The place

Rausu Kunashiri Observation Tower.

Rausu Kunashiri Observation Tower is an observation deck in Japan, 154 m above the sea.

On a clear day the farthest ridge you can see is 94 km away, looking north-east.

The sea fills 11% of the horizon.

25 named peaks rise above the relief in front; the most prominent is Tyatya (1,819 m), 93 km away.

The horizon is open, below your eyes, over 96% of the circle.

The skies are clearest from September to October.

Rausu Kunashiri Observatory Deck 2
Tzu-hsun, Hsu · CC BY-SA 4.0

Get there and stay

Plan the visit

A guided tour, a bed nearby, a car.

Some links above are affiliate links: if you book through them we may earn a commission, at no extra cost to you. It never changes what the data on this page says.

From above

The viewpoint and its surroundings.

The satellite image of the 6 × 6 km around the viewpoint, with what OpenStreetMap shows nearby.

Rausu Kunashiri Observation Tower seen from above (Sentinel-2)
Seen from above: Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 (EOX, CC BY 4.0), 6 × 6 km, north up. Points © OpenStreetMap contributors.

Around, in OpenStreetMap

  • 4other viewpoints within 5 km熊越の滝展望台, 羅臼国後展望塔 and 2 more
  • 1named peaks within 5 km英嶺山
  • 12car parks within 3 km
  • 1visitor centres within 5 kmMichinoeki Rausu
  • 5restaurants and cafés within 3 km
  • 3campsites within 10 km知床羅臼野遊びフィールド, 羅臼温泉野営場
  • 5places to stay within 10 km民宿よね丸, Shiretokoserai, Rider’s House and 2 more
  • cable car and funicular stations within 5 km
  • marked trails within 3 km
  • shelters and huts within 5 km

Counted in OpenStreetMap, the map anyone can edit. A low number may just mean nobody has mapped it yet.

In our other atlases

What you see from Rausu Kunashiri Observation Tower, and what is near.

Everything around this viewpoint — mountains, water, forests, birds, caves and the night sky — in the family's atlases.

Peakyas17 mountains within 25 km
Mount Rausu1,660 m · volcano · 8.4 kmMount Tencho1,046 m · volcano · 8.7 kmMount Sashirui1,564 m · 9.5 kmMount Minami1,459 m · 11 kmMount Chienbetsu1,544 m · 12 kmMount Higashi1,520 m · 13 kmMount Io1,563 m · volcano · 13 kmMount Onnebetsu1,330 m · volcano · 14 km
Lakeyas1 lakes within 15 km
Lake Rausu0.4 km² · 8.6 km

Figures from the sister sites' databases (Wikidata, HydroATLAS, GeoNames, OpenStreetMap, GBIF). Links open when each site is online.

Photographs

The view, as people saw it.

Rausu Riv 1 (2013-07-06)
Highten31 · CC BY-SA 3.0
Rausu Riv 1
Highten31 · CC BY-SA 3.0
Luminous moss in Makkausu Cave, Rausu, Hokkaido
DrTerraKhan · CC BY-SA 3.0

Other viewpoints nearby.

Rausu Kunashiri Observation Tower

Japan

  • 67Viewyas Score
  • 94 kmFarthest ridge
  • 25Peaks in view
  • 154 mAltitude

Kaiyodai

Japan · 51 km

  • 78Viewyas Score
  • 138 kmFarthest ridge
  • 43Peaks in view
  • 255 mAltitude

See the guide

Hosooka Observatory

Japan · 118 km

  • 79Viewyas Score
  • 151 kmFarthest ridge
  • 128Peaks in view
  • 50 mAltitude

See the guide

Taisetsu Observatory

Japan · 195 km

  • 51Viewyas Score
  • 26 kmFarthest ridge
  • 20Peaks in view
  • 401 mAltitude

See the guide

Where these figures come from

Name and typeWikidata (Q22341618) · CC0
SunJ. Meeus, Astronomical Algorithms
Peaks in viewPeakyas (Wikidata, CC0)
Panorama and altitudeCopernicus DEM GLO-90 / GLO-30 · © DLR e.V., © Airbus Defence and Space GmbH, Copernicus/ESA
CloudsNASA POWER (CERES SYN1deg, 2001–2020; MERRA-2)
What is around© OpenStreetMap contributors · ODbL
ImagesEOX Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 · CC BY 4.0; Wikimedia Commons
Sister atlasesPeakyas, Islandyas, Lakeyas, Darkskyas

Every figure is an average, an estimate or a count from a public dataset. Licences and methods: data sources.

The family

Do you prefer beaches, lakes, mountains, waterfalls, islands, rivers, canyons, caves, dark skies, viewpoints, birdwatching or forests?

Same idea, other landscapes: field atlases built on open data, in seven languages.