History and Outline

There is a long history between Namerikawa City and “hotaruika”(firefly squid) and a record of a catch of fish was remained around 1585. Hamada Tsunenosuke, a former Governor of Toyama Prefecture visited to Namerikawa City to recommend tourism. After that, the firefly squid tourism started in the city. The firefly squid sightseeing tour offered at night using three boats and started to produce processed foods of firefly squid around 1961. They later modified this tour in 1987, providing sightseeing tours in the early morning hours, and land tours also started in 1989 at the Fishermen Center by Namerikawa City Tourism Association. Firefly squid was designated as a representative fish of Toyama Prefecture in 1996 and the Hotaruika Museum was built in 1998.

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Project

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Collection and Exhibition

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Address

410 Nakagawara, Namerikawa-shi, Toyama-ken 936-0021 Japan

Telephone

+81 76-476-9300

Open

9:00am–5:00pm (no entry is permitted after 4:30pm)

Closed

Tuesday during the period from June 1 to March 19 (the following day if it falls on a national holiday), from December 31 to January 1
* Last Monday of January for three days
* The fallowing day if Tuesday falls on a national holiday

Parking

Parking provided (capacity of 10 large-sized buses and 100 cars)

Access

8 minutes walk from JR Namerikawa Station on the JR Hokuriku Line or Toyama Chiho Railway Namerikawa Station.
10 minutes by car from Hokuriku Expressway Namerikawa I.C.
40 minutes by car from Toyama Airport.

Highlight

The sea of Namerikawa attracts schools of firefly squid each year from spring to early summer. Its surface is designated a special natural monument of Japan. Namerikawa City has long been linked deeply with this firefly squid through fishery and tourism, and today promotes numerous programs inspired by its mysterious sparkle under the 21st-century development vision “Exciting, Glowing City of Light Namerikawa.”
The Hotaruika Museum answered the city’s wish for a core facility to its development plan. Its completion transformed the firefly squid from a seasonal to year-round tourism resource, and as an educational and cultural facility opened up a wide range of uses and possibilities.
Unlike a conventional museum that would simply introduce the habits of the firefly squid from a scientific perspective, the Hotaruika museum is unique—indeed the only of its kind in the world—in that it also uses a variety of the latest media to offer visitors the experience of the fantastic, even touching, bluish white light produced by the squid. The space invites you to take a journey to the seafloor guided by this mysterious light.

URL

http://www.hotaruikamuseum.com

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