Golden Kamuy: Otaru, Abashiri and Hokkaido

Golden Kamuy is set in Hokkaido just after the Russo-Japanese War, and Otaru is where the treasure hunt gets going. Saichi Sugimoto, a Hill 203 veteran who pans for gold, and the Ainu girl Asirpa start hunting tattooed escaped convicts here, and their first catch is Kasahara Kanjiro. Otaru was already tied to Sapporo by Hokkaido's first railway line, opened in 1880. Today it is known for its canal lined with Victorian-style street lamps.

Location precision: The story names the city, not a street; the pin marks central Otaru.

Visitor guidance: Walk the Otaru canal with its Victorian-style lamps; trains link the city with Sapporo.

The hunt moves to Yūbari. In the manga, Lieutenant Tsurumi visits and meets the taxidermist Edogai Yasaku, who owns a tattooed skin, and talks him into making six fakes. Sugimoto's group and Hijikata's group then fight over the forgeries. The real Yūbari was a coal mining town, founded as a city in 1943, and at its peak it held as many as 120,000 people.

Location precision: The story names the town, not a building; the pin marks central Yūbari.

On the way east, Sugimoto's group reaches Kushiro Marsh, where they meet Inkarmat and Chikapasi and learn that Tanigaki is being chased by Ainu who suspect him of killing animals. The real Kushiro-shitsugen National Park is a wetland of reeds, sedges, peat moss and black alder thickets. In the story, the group goes on from here toward Abashiri Prison.

Location precision: The story names the marsh in general; the pin marks the national park, not one scene.

The whole gold hunt starts from this prison. Per the story, the Ainu miner who hid the gold was held in Abashiri Prison, isolated, hobbled and tortured for its location, and the manga later stages a raid on it. The real prison opened in 1890 and is the northernmost in Japan, near the Abashiri River and east of Mount Tento. In 1983 its older parts were moved to the foot of Mount Tento and now operate as a museum.

Visitor guidance: The older buildings are the Abashiri Prison Museum at the foot of Mount Tento, which is separate from the working prison.

Late in the story, Sugimoto's and Hijikata's groups guess that the next attack on a woman will be at the Sapporo beer factory. A fight breaks out there, with the Seventh Division joining in. The real building matches only loosely: Sapporo Beer bought and remodeled a factory in 1903 to make beer, and the Sapporo Beer Museum opened in July 1987.

Location precision: The story names the factory, not an address; the pin marks the Sapporo Beer Museum, a former beer works.

Visitor guidance: The Sapporo Beer Museum is open to the public; check current hours.