Advice on places to stay to explore Hokkaido

Dear All

My wife and me are going to visit Hokkaido this summer from End of July to August for about two weeks. As we have heard it will be major travel season there and booking in advance is recommended. Has anyone a recommendation, which places will make a good base to explore the island? We will pick up a rental car in Hakodate and have 8nights to spend. After that we have allready planned 3 nights in Sapporo.

Does anyone have a recommendation which places we could stay? We guess it would be difficult to plan all the stops night by night on an exact route, so maybe 3 to 4 places each with 2-3 nights? Any ideas?

Thank you very much if you could help us.

Hokkaido is beautiful but it's also large. At present I've picked up a car at Wakkanai (up North) and have driven down to Sapporo via Noboribetsu.

How many people are travelling? What type of things do you like to do? Do you like driving? Do you like wildflowers? Do you like flower parks? My main problem is your general question is too vague for me to give you good advice at present. Other might be more skilled in this case

my best suggestion is to determine which festivals will be occurring during your time so that you can make plans to get a hotel. you are going in peak season and i agree with setting up a few home bases. even though Hokkaido is a big island, we drove to Kushiro and back from Sapporo and enjoyed the trip and eastern Hokkaido. you need to do some good research and try to time your stops during local festivals

Hi all

Thank u for your answers. It seems to be a bit tricky I see. I like the idea abt the festivals though...thanks for the recommendation. Some more details about us: couple, 30 years, definitely driving (car for the whole trip except sapporo in the end), mainly interrested in nature (landscape), hiking, photography, cuisine and, if possible some cultural experience (e.g. homestay etc).

So are there any areas to recommend to set as a base? Like stay central of the island? Is it worth visiting for example the very north or is there one corner definitely not to take into consideration? We just know that it will be super busy and that we should make reservation, but somehow I dont believe I want to reserve like day by day every stop and have a 100% unflexible planning...

mainly interrested in nature (landscape), hiking, photography, cuisine and, if possible some cultural experience (e.g. homestay etc).

You wrote nature first, so I would recommend to go north, that is Rebun island specifically. Of course Rebun is an island, not so big, so that taking a rental car is not a good idea. Stay there for 2 or 3 nights will be very nice experience.

Other two destinations should be Daisetsuzan and Shiretoko which can be accessed from around Asahikawa and Shiretoko-Shari respectively. It will take 5 hours each to go from Wakkanai to Asahikawa and Asahikawa to Shiretoko-Shari so it might be tiring drive. You might better take public transportation for long distance and rent a car at each place (Asahikawa and Shiretoko-Shari).

Note that Hokkaido in late July to early August is very popular tourist destination. You might better check hotel booking sites to find appropriate accommodations when you decided the itinerary.

Rishiri & Rebun Island really are quite pretty and the wildflowers can be spectacular. You would not hire a car to get to the islands. They are a far distance from other locations though.

The other highlights of my trips to Hokkaido include Furano/Beil to some degree, the Daisatsuzan National Park, Noboribetsu and Hakodate (with Onuma Koen being pretty). I've only visited Kushiro in Autumn so I cannot say much about the east coast of Hokkaido apart from it's sparsely populated.