Where Does Yuru Camp Take Place?
Location Guide · 5 min read
Published October 8, 2026
The Yuru Camp△ franchise takes place in Minobu, Yamanashi, on the shore of Lake Motosu, the same lake all three entries return to. Yuru Camp△, its Season 2, and the 2022 film keep Rin Shima's original campsite as their shared anchor, then spread out in different directions: Season 2 runs south down the Izu Peninsula and into Hamamatsu, and the film drives as far as Nagoya. Between the three we have verified 228 real locations, and Minobu alone accounts for 46 of them. In Japan the series is titled ゆるキャン△; the English localization is Laid-Back Camp, from Afro's original manga.
Where does the Yuru Camp△ franchise take place?
Minobu sits in southern Yamanashi, on Lake Motosu's western shore, and it is where the story's fictional Motosu High School and its outdoor activities club are based. The school itself has no real campus. Japanese Wikipedia's setting section names the actual model instead: the ruined grounds of Shimobe Elementary School and Shimobe Junior High School, both closed in 2016 and 2017, off Yamanashi Prefectural Route 419. The lakeside campsite the girls treat as their default spot is not disguised at all. Our own catalog and the same Wikipedia article agree on the name: Koan Campground, on Motosu's northwest bank. Nadeshiko Kagamihara's home is written as further south in Nambu, along the Minobu Line she and her classmates ride to school, and Wikipedia's article adds a detail our catalog independently backs up: before the story starts, she is said to have lived near Lake Hamana in Hamamatsu, which is why Hamamatsu keeps turning up across all three entries.
Minobu and Lake Motosu, the anchor across three entries
Minobu carries 46 confirmed spots split across the three titles (13 in the original series, 25 in Season 2, 8 in the film), more than any other city on the map. Koan Campground itself appears in all three. Minobu Station and the Minobu-Manju Bench, where the characters buy the town's steamed buns, show up in both the original series and Season 2. So does Selva Minobu, the real supermarket inside the Frespo Minobu shopping complex that Wikipedia names as the model for the story's fictional "Zebra" market. The film jumps the timeline forward: a grown-up cast returns to Minobu's Kuonji Station, the base of the Mount Minobu ropeway, and the Nichiren Shonin Oteue Sugi cedar near it, to build a permanent campsite, the plot English Wikipedia gives for the movie.
Nambu and the Minobu Line
Eleven confirmed spots sit in Nambu, immediately south of Minobu on the same rail line. Utsubuna Station and Nanbu Bridge, both named in Nambu's Wikipedia-documented setting as Nadeshiko's home turf, appear in the original series, Season 2, and the film alike. JR Central's Minobu Line is the spine connecting Nambu and Minobu north to Kofu, and it is the line Nadeshiko actually commutes on in the anime, complete with a real 313-series train reproduced on screen, according to Wikipedia's account of JR Central's cooperation with the production.
Fujinomiya and the Asagiri Highlands
Fujinomiya, at the foot of Mount Fuji in Shizuoka, holds 15 confirmed spots between the original series and Season 2. Fumotoppara Campground, a working campground with an open view of the mountain, anchors the original series' visit. Season 2 adds the Fujisan Hongu Sengen Taisha Shrine, including its second torii gate. Wikipedia's collaboration section notes that Afro has drawn manga pages at a campground in the city, and that Fujinomiya's city government has played along publicly, once posting staff photos recreating scenes from the show.
Season 2's biggest reach: Hamamatsu and the Izu Peninsula
Season 2 carries 142 of the franchise's 228 verified locations, and more than a quarter of them, 37 across seven towns, sit on the Izu Peninsula: Shimoda's Cape Tsumekizaki Lighthouse, Nishiizu's Sawada Park with its open-air bath, and Mount Omuro in Ito among them. None of it appears in the original series or the film. Hamamatsu itself carries 15 more Season 2 spots along the Lake Hamana coast, including the Maisaka waterfront and Poko-chan Beach, on top of one apiece in the other two entries. That recurring Hamamatsu cluster is the same city Wikipedia names as Nadeshiko's home before the series begins.
Season 1's own reach: Suwa and the Yatsugatake highlands
The original series has an expansion of its own that neither Season 2 nor the film repeats: 15 confirmed spots across seven Nagano towns in the Suwa and Yatsugatake highlands. Takabotchi Highlands in Shiojiri and Takabocchi Mountain in Okaya are the same ridge, split by a municipal border; Korobokkuru Hutte, a mountain hut cafe in Suwa, and the Kirigamine Venus Line scenic road round out the cluster.
The film's road trip: Nagoya, Tokyo and the drive home
The 2022 film, titled 映画 ゆるキャン△ in Japan, sends the cast further than either television season, 34 confirmed spots in total. Nagoya and neighboring Ichinomiya in Aichi hold 10 of them, anchored by Nagoya Station and its Nana-chan mascot doll, the furthest point the catalog places any Yuru Camp△ story from Yamanashi. On the way, the film also stops at Mori Park Outdoor Village in Akishima, on Tokyo's western edge, and passes through two Chuo Expressway rest areas, EXPASA Dangozaka in Uenohara and a Yatsugatake parking area in Hokuto, before ending back at Minobu.
Is Motosu High School in Yuru Camp△ a real place?
No. Motosu High School and its outdoor activities club exist only in the story. What is real is the site the anime uses as its stand-in: the grounds where Shimobe Elementary and Junior High Schools stood before both closed in 2016 and 2017, and the road that runs past them. Visit the campground and the town, not a functioning campus.
Which studio animates Yuru Camp△?
C-Station animates all three entries. The original series ran 12 episodes from 4 January to 22 March 2018 (official site), Season 2 ran 13 episodes from 7 January to 1 April 2021 (official site), and the film released 1 July 2022 (official site), directed by Yoshiaki Kyogoku from an original story by Jin Tanaka and Mutsumi Ito. All three adapt Afro's manga, which also gave the world of mono, a different series set in the same Yamanashi lake country Minobu sits in.
Keep exploring
- Where Does mono Take Place? Afro's other Yamanashi series, centered on Kofu rather than Minobu, though the two maps overlap more there than anywhere else.
- Which Prefecture Has the Most Anime Locations? Yamanashi's numbers, this franchise included, against every other prefecture on the map.
- Open the anime map. Every verified location in Japan, searchable by title.