Guide to facilities
Cross-country skiing at Taisetsu
National Taisetsu Youth Friendship Center
The facility is located within Daisetsuzan National Park in a nature-rich environment surrounded
by imposing mountains and primeval forests.
The facility takes advantage of local characteristics to offer the nature of four seasons and training programs such as mountain climbing and hiking, along with a cross-country skiing course in the winter.
Hidaka – Powder snow in -20°C weather
National Hidaka Youth Outdoor Learning Center
Located two hours by car from Sapporo, Asahikawa or Shin-Chitose Airport, the National
Hidaka Youth Outdoor Learning Center offers hiking and river rafting in clear waters in the
summer and powder snow skiing on an adjoining slope in the winter, together with a variety of
activities using Hidaka’s many sports facilities.
Iwatesan – Mountains, snow, michinoku (the northeast)
National Iwatesan Youth Friendship Center
Located in the nature-rich foothills of towering Mt. Iwate, the National Iwatesan Youth Friendship Center (a.k.a. Ten Park) offers mountain climbing, camping, outdoor cooking, winter skiing, and a variety of other nature experience activities throughout the year, as well as creative activities using natural materials, experience of living with disabilities, and activities in a nanbu magariya (old farm house).
Hanayama – Stream activities
National Hanayama Youth Outdoor Learning Center
The center is located in the expansive nature of Kurikoma Nanroku, seated near the very center of Tohoku and adjoining Miyagi, Iwate, and Akita Prefectures. Stream activities offer physical experience in the abundant waters of the Kurikoma Range, along with programs such as adventure trips and environmental learning within the vast wilderness over the four seasons.
Bandai mountain and lake
National Bandai Youth Friendship Center
Located on the south side of Mt. Bandai in Bandai-Asahi National Park, this facility faces the highly transparent Lake Inawashiro, offering rich, natural mountain and lake surroundings. The center can host outdoor activities throughout the year, such as mountain climbing in the summer and skiing in the winter, and is also actively involved in environmental activities covering the lake and marshlands.
Nasukashi – A “fun-iversity” of river and forests
National Nasukashi Youth Outdoor Learning Center
The National Nasukashi Youth Outdoor Learning Center, with its main building, campground, and outdoor cooking facilities located throughout the vast, 1.3 million sqm property in nature-filled Nikko National Park, is a “fun-iversity” of river and forests that values learning through nature experiences including environmental learning at the Abukuma River headwaters, forest hiking, and walking skiing and snowshoeing over powder snow.
National Olympics Memorial Youth Center
Located in the verdant Yoyogi Forests of Tokyo, the National Olympics Memorial Youth Center is the nation’s largest urban youth education facility, supporting a range of training and an array of youth activities including culture, arts, sports, and international exchange, and serves as a venue for rich learning experiences.
Akagi – The forest of the environment
National Akagi Youth Friendship Center
Mt. Akagi overlooking the Kanto Plain is nature-rich with primeval forests surrounding lakes and marshes of crater lakes and high moors. The National Akagi Youth Friendship Center, located midway up this mountain takes advantage of the natural environment to offer experiential programs such as mountain climbing and hiking.
Shinshu Takato – White birches
National ShinshuTakato Youth Outdoor Learning Center
Overlooking the Central and Southern Alps and situated in the Haregamine Highlands of Takato-cho, Ina known for Kohigan cherry trees at the Takato Castle ruins, are log houses and lodges scattered throughout the surrounding white birch and larch forests. With the motto, “Discover, think, taste, and enjoy the blessings of nature,” the center supports variety experiential activities.
Myoko – In the snow
National Myoko Youth Outdoor Learning Center
The National Myoko Youth Outdoor Learning Center in the Joshinetsu Kogen National Park, which is known as one of the heaviest snowfall in Japan, offers a variety of snow activities in the green season (from spring to fall). Myoko is undeniably an all-season base-camp of experiential learning.
Tateyama – Mountain climbing and stars
National Tateyama Youth Outdoor Learning Center
The National Tateyama Youth Outdoor Learning Center, located on a hill over Fudodaira at the foot of the Tateyama Range, works with its motto, “Experiencing nature from the early years” to offer youth leader training programs, camping programs aimed at lower-grade elementary school students and infants, and training support programs such as mountain climbing and constellation studies.
Noto – Satoumi/satoyama landscape
National Noto Youth Friendship Center
The National Noto Youth Friendship Center, located on the nature-rich Bijo Flats closely overlooking the Sea of Japan at Hakui City, serving as the entrance to the Noto Peninsula, offers youth step-up support programs and a variety of experiential activities that capitalize on its satoumi/satoyama landscape.
Wakasa Bay – The ocean road
National Wakasawan Youth Outdoor Learning Center
Since long ago, Wakasa Bay has thrived as the gateway to the continental mainland, where an “ocean road” still runs to Asia. Setting the stage on this vast ocean, the National Wakasawan Youth Outdoor Learning Center offers nature experiences filled with oceanic excitement, such as cutter boating, sea kayaking, and snorkeling.
Chuo – The land of Fuji
National Chuo Youth Friendship Center
The National Chuo Youth Friendship Center, closely overlooking Japan’s highest peak Mt. Fuji, is a facility built to commemorate the emperor’s marriage to the Crown Princess. Near the Tokyo metropolitan area, it serves 180,000 people annually, used by youths from foreign countries as well as for youth group camps and college student seminars and club activities.
Norikura – 1,510 meters above sea level
National Norikura Youth Friendship Center
The National Norikura Youth Friendship Center is located in the Hida Norikura Highlands with the Shuho Norikura Peak of the Northern Alps as a backdrop and surrounded by white birch forests, and offers nature experiences such as mountain climbing and skiing in its seasonally blessed nature, and experiential programs that take advantage of its highlands at an elevation of 1,510 meters.
Soni – Grand field of pampas grass
National Soni Youth Outdoor Learning Center
The National Soni Youth Outdoor Learning Center, located on the pampas grass-covered Soni Highlands in Murou Akame Aoyama National Park at the border of Nara and Mie Prefectures, offers mountain hiking and nature observation programs that take advantage of the surrounding nature, and training support programs such as craftwork using pampas grass and bamboo, in addition to stargazing.
Awaji – Beautiful beaches with white sand and green pines
National Awaji Youth Friendship Center
The National Awaji Youth Friendship Center on the southern end of Awaji Island overlooks Fukiagehama beach, voted one of Japan’s 100 most beautiful beaches with white sand and green pines. The facility offers a variety of experiential programs such as the popular cutter boat training and a local exploration program that uses a walk rally to learn about local history.
Kibi – Land of Momotaro
National Kibi Youth Outdoor Learning Center
The Kibi Youth Outdoor Learning Center in the “Land of Momotaro” is located almost at the heart of Okayama Prefecture in the Kibi Highlands at an elevation of 300-360 meters, and offers cutter boats, hiking, orienteering, and various other experiential activities that capitalize on its manmade Narutaki Lake within its premises and a nature-rich environment surrounded by red pine forests.
Sanbe – Green shower
National Sanbe Youth Friendship Center
The National Sanbe Youth Friendship Center is at the corner of a natural forest in National Park- Mt. Sanbe located in the heart of Shimane Prefecture. The facility offers mountain climbing, cycling, and a variety of nature experience activities under a “green shower” of negative ions mostly from the facing Mt. Otoko Sanbe (main peak: elevation 1,126 meters).
Etajima – Cutters
National Etajima Youth Friendship Center
The National Etajima Youth Friendship Center located in the northwestern area of scenic Etajima Island in Hiroshima Bay develops youths’ sense of independence and motivation through marine activities such as cutter training and a variety of learning, sports, and outdoor activities in the warm Setouchi climate and nature-rich environment.
Yamaguchi Tokuji – Forest of adventure
National Yamaguchi Tokuji Youth Outdoor Learning Center
Located in central Yamaguchi Prefecture and within Prefectural Chomonkyo Nature Park, the National Yamaguchi Tokuji Youth Outdoor Learning Center is called the “Forest of Adventure” in offering experiential programs for youths, centered on its Tokuji Adventure Education Program that trains youths’ zest for living.
Ozu – Canoeing
National Ozu Youth Friendship Center
Ozu, located in western Shikoku and called the “Little Kyoto in Iyo [Ehime],” is where the Hijikawa river calmly flows. On the Hijikawa the facility offers its primary canoe programs and other outdoor, cultural, and sports activities in the seasonal nature.
Muroto – Water Wise
National Muroto Youth Outdoor Learning Center
Overlooking Cape Muroto to its south and surrounded by rich greenery, the National Muroto Youth Outdoor Learning Center offers Water Wise Programs that develop competent skills and receptive senses through a variety of nature experience activities on the ocean.
Yasukogen – Starry skies
National Yasukogen Youth Outdoor Learning Center
The facility is located in central Fukuoka Prefecture, easily accessible from the city. Youths can view a variety of animals, plants, and insects throughout the year, and casually enjoy nature through events such as field bingo and photo rallies. They can also observe the moon and the starry sky on a clear nights using the facility’s 200 mm telescope.
Isahaya – Forests and streams
National Isahaya Youth Outdoor Learning Center
Located in the Tara Range bordering Nagasaki and Saga Prefectures and blessed with a natural environment of mountains and streams, the National Isahaya Youth Outdoor Center offers a variety of nature experience programs including mountain climbing, gorge climbing, outdoor cooking, stargazing, orienteering, and craftwork, suited to age groups and run with strict safety management.
Aso – Grand meadow of a thousand years
National Aso Youth Friendship Center
Located within Aso-Kuju National Park seated at almost the very center of Kyushu and in the deep part of the Five Aso Peaks, the National Aso Youth Friendship Center offers experiential programs for enjoying nature such as mountain climbing, orienteering, and wild grass observation in its thousand-year meadow passed down from the lives of local ancestors.
Osumi – Golden sunset of Kinko Bay
National Osumi Youth Outdoor Learning Center
Overlooking Kinko Bay (Kagoshima Bay), located almost at the center of Osumi Peninsula in Kagoshima Prefecture, and taking on a golden color at sunset, the National Osumi Youth Outdoor Learning Center at the foot of the Takakuma Range offers nature experience programs on the sea and in the mountains and rivers, including canoeing, rafting, mountain climbing, and hiking.
Okinawa – Summer-all-year island
National Okinawa Youth Friendship Center
The National Okinawa Youth Friendship Center, on Tokashiki Island 32 km to west of Naha City on mainland Okinawa, takes advantage of its subtropical blessings to offer oceanic programs from spring through fall. The facility is widely used for baseball and other outdoor sports camps because of its warm climate in winter.