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Local life 130 History 394 Onsen 66 Craft 81 Nature 316 Food 191 Culture 110 Entertainment 31

Prefecture

Hokkaido 104 Kyoto 91 Tokyo 79 Okinawa 68 Chiba 51 Kanagawa 44 Osaka 41 Akita 35 Aomori 35 Hyogo 34 Nara 33 Ehime 33 Fukui 29 Fukuoka 29 Aichi 28 Nagano 28 Hiroshima 26 Kagawa 26 Nagasaki 24 Miyagi 24 Wakayama 23 Shiga 22 Gunma 21 Fukushima 21 Kumamoto 21 Saitama 20 Kochi 20 Yamanashi 19 Miyazaki 19 Gifu 19 Mie 18 Kagoshima 18 Iwate 18 Tochigi 17 Shizuoka 17 Ishikawa 17 Yamaguchi 16 Shimane 16 Saga 15 Okayama 15 Ibaraki 14 Tokushima 14 Oita 14 Niigata 13 Tottori 11 Yamagata 10 Toyama 9

Editor’s pick

★★★ 476 ★★ 635 ★ 208

★ is our editors' take — ★★★ can't-miss classics · ★★ worth a detour · ★ quiet favourites.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★★

  Fushimi Inari Taisha — Kyoto's mountain of torii gates

  Japan's most famous torii-gate mountain — open 24 hours, free, minutes from Kyoto Station.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★★

  Kiyomizu-dera — Kyoto's cliffside temple and its wooden stage

  Kyoto's most famous temple in early-morning quiet, up the pottery lane, not the crowds.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★★

  Kinkaku-ji — the Golden Pavilion mirrored in its pond

  Kyoto's famous gold pavilion, at its calmest and most mirror-like on a wet morning

• 

  Nature Kyoto ★★★

  Arashiyama Bamboo Grove

  A world-famous 400m bamboo corridor — free by day, and far quieter early.

• 

  History Osaka ★★★

  Nishinomaru Garden

  An open lawn with a clean, uncrowded view of the keep over the moat.

• 

  Food Osaka ★★★

  The Glico Sign at Dotonbori

  Osaka's most famous sign, quiet and easy to photograph in the early morning.

• 

  History Nara ★★★

  Nigatsudo Hall — Todaiji's open veranda over Nara

  A National Treasure hall with a free 24-hour veranda and the widest dawn view over Nara.

• 

  History Tokyo ★★★

  Senso-ji — Tokyo's oldest temple

  Tokyo's oldest temple at its quietest: at dawn the 250-metre approach is near-empty.

• 

  History Tokyo ★★★

  Meiji Jingu — a Tokyo shrine, calm at dawn

  A famous shrine that is genuinely calm at dawn if you use the quiet north gate near Yoyogi.

• 

  Local life Tokyo ★★★

  Shibuya Scramble Crossing

  The world's busiest crossing, nearly empty at 7 a.m. Sunday — see its full shape.

• 

  Local life Tokyo ★★★

  Tokyo Tower's open-air staircase

  Climb Tokyo's icon on foot — 600 open-air steps through the steel, no glass between you and the city.

• 

  Local life Tokyo ★★★

  Jukken Bridge — where Skytree stands upside-down in the canal

  Tokyo's best-known spot to catch the Skytree tower mirrored upside-down in a canal — free.

• 

  Food Tokyo ★★★

  Tsukiji Outer Market

  Tokyo's historic food market, still working — come early, before the tour groups.

• 

  History Kanagawa ★★★

  The Great Buddha of Kamakura

  Japan's famous open-air bronze Buddha; arrive at the 8:00 opening to beat the crowds.

• 

  History Nara ★★★

  Horyu-ji — the world's oldest surviving wooden buildings

  The world's oldest wooden buildings — a UNESCO World Heritage Site open daily from 8:00, about 35 minutes from JR Nara Station.

• 

  History Wakayama ★★★

  Koyasan Okunoin — the cedar-lined approach to Kobo Daishi's mausoleum

  Koyasan's most sacred site — a 2 km cedar path through 1,000 years of graves to a lantern-lit mausoleum. Free entry, open 24 hours.

• 

  Entertainment Osaka ★★★

  Universal Studios Japan

  Asia's most visited theme park — Harry Potter and Super Nintendo World in Osaka, 20 minutes from JR Osaka Station. Book tickets in advance.

• 

  Local life Tokyo ★★★

  Tokyo Skytree

  Japan's tallest tower at 634 m — clear winter mornings reveal Fuji-san from the 350 m deck. One stop from Asakusa.

• 

  Culture Tokyo ★★★

  Ghibli Museum

  Japan's most coveted museum ticket — book on the 10th of the previous month at 10:00 through Lawson Ticket, or you will not get in.

• 

  Entertainment Chiba ★★★

  Tokyo Disney Resort

  The only Disney park themed on the sea — and the first Disney park ever built outside the US; both at one station.

• 

  History Chiba ★★★

  Naritasan Shinshoji — a thousand-year temple through an Edo-era town

  A thousand-year pilgrimage temple, 15 minutes on foot from Narita Station through an Edo-era merchant street.

• 

  History Kanagawa ★★★

  Enoshima Island

  Shonan's island shrine — 1,500-year-old Benzaiten, sea caves, and a lighthouse tower with a Mount Fuji view.

• 

  History Kanagawa ★★★

  Hakone Shrine and the Peace Torii

  Hakone's iconic lake torii, standing since 1952 — free entry, clear Fuji view on calm autumn mornings.

• 

  Nature Kanagawa ★★★

  Ōwakudani — an active volcanic valley of steam

  Japan's most accessible active volcanic valley — steam vents, black eggs, and a ropeway ride over the crater.

• 

  History Saitama ★★★

  Kawagoe Ichibangai — the Edo warehouse street

  The best-preserved Edo merchant streetscape within an hour of Tokyo — black-walled storehouses still lining both sides of a working shopping street.

• 

  Nature Osaka ★★★

  Osaka Aquarium Kaiyukan

  One of Asia's premier aquariums — the 9-metre Pacific Ocean tank with whale sharks is a highlight of any Osaka visit.

• 

  Nature Kyoto ★★★

  Togetsukyo Bridge

  Kyoto's most iconic mountain river crossing — free to walk across at any hour, framed by cherry blossoms in spring and red maples in autumn.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★★

  Tofuku-ji — a Zen temple over a maple ravine

  Kyoto's most celebrated autumn foliage view — the maple ravine seen from Tsutenkyo Bridge, in one of the city's five great Zen temples.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★★

  Nanzen-ji — a Zen temple with a brick aqueduct

  Japan's highest-ranked Zen temple, with a free-entry compound containing a working 1890 brick aqueduct and a monumental 1628 gate.

• 

  Local life Osaka ★★★

  Tenjinbashisuji Shopping Street

  Japan's longest covered shopping street — 2.6 km of everyday Osaka life, roofed and free to walk.

• 

  History Hyogo ★★★

  Takeda Castle Ruins

  One of Japan's most dramatic castle ruins: a 353-metre hilltop, intact stone walls, and on autumn mornings, a valley of cloud below. Allow ~2.5 hours from Osaka each way.

• 

  History Tokyo ★★★

  Tokyo Station

  The 1914 red-brick façade at the centre of Japan's rail network — free to view from the plaza, best in morning or late-afternoon light.

• 

  Local life Kanagawa ★★★

  Yokohama Minato Mirai 21 — a waterfront district on a former shipyard

  Yokohama's waterfront district built on a former shipyard — the walk from the Red Brick Warehouses to the Landmark Tower takes about 20 minutes.

• 

  History Ibaraki ★★★

  Ushiku Daibutsu — a 120-metre bronze Buddha

  One of the world's five tallest statues — with an elevator inside — an hour from Ueno by JR.

• 

  Local life Hyogo ★★★

  Akashi Kaikyo Bridge

  Walk inside the girder of the world's longest suspension bridge, 47 metres above the Akashi Strait — 25 minutes from Sannomiya (Kobe) by JR local.

• 

  Nature Nara ★★★

  Yoshino Mountain

  Japan's most celebrated sakura mountain — 30,000 trees in four tiers, UNESCO temples, 75 min direct from Osaka on Kintetsu.

• 

  History Nara ★★★

  Hasedera Temple

  The Temple of Flowers in Yamato — 399-step covered stairway, cliff-edge main hall, and one of Japan's largest wooden Kannon statues. 50 min from Osaka on Kintetsu.

• 

  History Wakayama ★★★

  Kumano Hongu Taisha — the head shrine of the Kodo pilgrimage

  The head shrine of Japan's Kumano faith — UNESCO pilgrimage terminus, world's largest torii gate at Oyunohara, cedar-shaded valley of Wakayama.

• 

  History Osaka ★★★

  Osaka Castle

  Osaka's most iconic landmark — walk the great stone moats, then enter the museum keep for the full picture.

• 

  Food Kyoto ★★★

  Nishiki Market

  Kyoto's 400-year food market in a covered lane — best early on a weekday when it is still a working street.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★★

  Gion — Kyoto's teahouse quarter

  Kyoto's famous teahouse quarter — the lantern-lit street in the evening and the willow canal at dawn.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★★

  Byodo-in — the Heian temple of the Phoenix Hall

  Japan's most iconic Heian temple — the 10-yen coin building, reflected in its own pond, and one of the oldest Buddha statues you can see up close.

• 

  History Nara ★★★

  Todai-ji and Nara Park — the temple of the great Buddha

  One of the world's largest wooden halls and its giant bronze Buddha — arrive early, then climb to Nigatsu-do for the view.

• 

  Culture Tokyo ★★★

  Ueno Park

  Tokyo's great cultural commons — Japan's oldest museum, a Le Corbusier UNESCO building, and a lotus pond, all in one park.

• 

  Food Tokyo ★★★

  Toyosu Market

  The world's largest seafood market — watch the wholesale floor from the glass gallery above, no reservation needed.

• 

  Nature Tokyo ★★★

  Mount Takao

  Michelin three-star mountain 50 minutes from Shinjuku — old-growth forest, a tengu temple, and a Fuji view on clear days.

• 

  History Shiga ★★★

  Hikone Castle

  One of Japan's five National Treasure castle keeps — entirely original, set over double moats on the shore of Lake Biwa.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★★

  Ryoan-ji — Kyoto's Zen rock garden

  The world's most studied Zen garden — fifteen stones, raked white gravel, and a composition that rewards patient looking.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★★

  Tenryu-ji — a 700-year-old garden framed by mountains

  A 700-year-old garden with mountains borrowed as its backdrop — come at opening and walk through to the bamboo grove in a single morning.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★★

  Sanjusangendo — the hall of 1,001 golden Kannon

  Japan's longest wooden hall, packed with 1,001 gilded Kannon — 10 minutes from Kyoto Station and one of the most extraordinary interiors in the country.

• 

  History Hyogo ★★★

  Himeji Castle

  Often called Japan's finest castle — the white keep, the maze of gates, and the view from the top floor.

• 

  History Wakayama ★★★

  Kumano Nachi Taisha — vermilion shrine at Japan's highest waterfall

  Japan's tallest single-drop waterfall beside a vermilion shrine on the Kumano pilgrimage route — a UNESCO World Heritage landscape.

• 

  History Mie ★★★

  Ise Jingu Naiku & Oharai-machi — Japan's most sacred Shinto shrine

  Japan's most sacred Shinto shrine, rebuilt every 20 years since 690 CE — free to enter, calm in the early morning, about 80 minutes from Nagoya.

• 

  Nature Yamanashi ★★★

  Lake Kawaguchiko

  Japan's most reachable Fuji lake — the northern shore delivers the reflection view. Direct bus from Shinjuku.

• 

  History Yamanashi ★★★

  Arakurayama Sengen Park

  The world's most recognised Japan photograph — pagoda, cherry blossoms, and Mount Fuji. Come before 9:00 on a clear day.

• 

  Nature Tochigi ★★★

  Ashikaga Flower Park

  Japan's most dramatic wisteria park — a 150-year-old vine canopy about 90 minutes from Tokyo.

• 

  Nature Ibaraki ★★★

  Kairakuen — one of Japan's three great gardens

  One of Japan's Three Great Gardens — 3,000 plum trees in early spring, free before 9 am even at peak.

• 

  History Gunma ★★★

  Tomioka Silk Mill

  Japan's first modern silk factory, built 1872 and UNESCO-listed — the original iron-frame brick halls, unchanged.

• 

  Nature Ibaraki ★★★

  Hitachi Seaside Park

  5.3 million nemophila cover Miharashi Hill in April-May, and the same hill turns crimson with kochia in autumn — the most photographed seasonal flower event in Ibaraki.

• 

  Nature Yamanashi ★★★

  Oshino Hakkai — Mount Fuji's eight spring ponds

  Eight glacier-clear spring ponds fed by Fuji snowmelt — all part of the Fuji UNESCO World Heritage Site.

• 

  Nature Wakayama ★★★

  Nanki Shirahama — Japan's oldest hot-spring coast

  Japan's oldest recorded hot-spring coast: a sea arch, a wave-cut rock platform, and a cliffside cave — all within a few kilometres of each other.

• 

  Entertainment Yamanashi ★★★

  Fuji-Q Highland — Japan's most extreme roller coaster park

  Japan's most extreme coaster park, at the foot of Mount Fuji — free gate entry, world-class rides, direct rail access from Tokyo.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★★

  Daigo-ji Temple

  Kyoto's oldest wooden structure — a 951 CE pagoda surrounded by cherry trees with a 400-year-old pedigree.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★★

  Daitoku-ji Temple

  Kyoto's finest Zen dry-garden complex — 22 sub-temples behind one walled enclosure, four open year-round, the best karesansui in the city.

• 

  Culture Tokyo ★★★

  Edo-Tokyo Museum

  Walk across a full-scale replica of Nihonbashi — the zero-point of old Japan's road system — and see Tokyo's whole 400-year arc in one morning.

• 

  History Kanagawa ★★★

  Engaku-ji — the Zen mountain temple of Kita-Kamakura

  Kamakura's second Great Zen Mountain — walk straight from the station exit to one of Japan's finest medieval bronze bells.

• 

  History Shiga ★★★

  Enryaku-ji Temple

  Mount Hiei's mountaintop monastery — where the founders of Japan's major Buddhist schools trained, and a single flame has burned for 1,200 years.

• 

  History Nara ★★★

  Gangō-ji Temple

  Japan's oldest Buddhist lineage, quietly tucked among Naramachi's old townhouses — a different Nara from the deer park.

• 

  Nature Kanagawa ★★★

  Hakone Open-Air Museum

  Japan's first open-air sculpture park — the Picasso Pavilion and stained-glass tower are the highlights; arrive at 9:00 and walk the garden before the day-trippers arrive.

• 

  Nature Tokyo ★★★

  Hama-rikyu Gardens

  The only seawater tidal pond in Tokyo, a 300-yen entry, and an island teahouse — a real garden in the middle of the city.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★★

  Heian-jingu Shrine

  One of Kyoto's grandest shrine courtyards, free to enter, with four nationally designated gardens that bloom in every season.

• 

  History Nara ★★★

  Heijo Palace Site

  Japan's best-preserved ancient palace site — UNESCO-listed, free to enter, and vast enough to feel genuinely historic.

• 

  Culture Tokyo ★★★

  Kabuki-za Theatre

  About 1,500 yen on the day gets you one hour in Japan's main Kabuki theatre, in the building that has occupied the same Ginza block for over 130 years.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★★

  Kamigamo Shrine

  Kyoto's oldest shrine — wide sand courtyard, a riverside bridge hall, and the Aoi Festival's destination since the sixth century.

• 

  History Kanagawa ★★★

  Kencho-ji — Japan's first Zen monastery

  Japan's oldest Zen monastery; arrive at 8:30 for the quiet compound before the day-trippers arrive.

• 

  Local life Hyogo ★★★

  Kobe Harborland & Meriken Park

  Kobe's open waterfront in one easy walk — Port Tower, BE KOBE, earthquake memorial, and the red-brick Harborland warehouses, best at sunset.

• 

  History Nara ★★★

  Kofuku-ji — the Ashura statue and Japan's second-tallest pagoda

  The Ashura statue in the National Treasure Hall and Japan's second-tallest wooden pagoda, side by side in Nara Park.

• 

  History Wakayama ★★★

  Kumano Hayatama Taisha — one of the three Sanzan pilgrimage shrines

  The most train-accessible of the three Kumano Sanzan UNESCO shrines — the ancient nagi tree and the vermilion halls are the heart of a Kii Peninsula pilgrimage.

• 

  Food Osaka ★★★

  Kuromon Ichiba Market

  Osaka's most lively covered market — fresh seafood, street food, and the texture of a real working market all in one walkable stretch.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★★

  Kyoto Imperial Palace & Gyoen

  A thousand years of imperial Kyoto, free and open since 2016 — with a 65-hectare park that is never closed.

• 

  Nature Kanagawa ★★★

  Lake Ashi

  Hakone's most photographed scene — best on a clear autumn morning when Fuji rises behind the red torii gate. Board at Moto-Hakone-ko.

• 

  Nature Yamanashi ★★★

  Lake Yamanakako

  The Fuji Five Lake closest to the summit — clear Fuji views from the north shore, and Diamond Fuji twice a year at sunset.

• 

  Culture Shiga ★★★

  Miho Museum

  I.M. Pei's mountain museum, 80% buried in the Shigaraki hills — the cherry-blossom approach, the silver tunnel, and a world-class collection of ancient art make this one of Japan's most architecturally deliberate museum experiences.

• 

  Culture Tokyo ★★★

  Mori Art Museum & Tokyo City View

  Contemporary art + panoramic night view on 52–53F, open until 22:00 — combine both in one evening visit.

• 

  Nature Yamanashi ★★★

  Mount Fuji

  Japan's highest mountain and most iconic image — the 5th Station at 2,305 m is accessible by bus and often above the cloud layer on clear mornings.

• 

  Culture Nara ★★★

  Nara National Museum

  Japan's leading Buddhist art museum in Nara Park — permanent sculpture gallery year-round, and the once-a-year Shōsōin Exhibition in autumn.

• 

  Local life Nara ★★★

  Naramachi — the lattice-windowed machiya district

  Nara's intact old merchant quarter: Edo and Meiji machiya on an eighth-century street grid, with cafes, craft shops, and red monkey-doll folk charms.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★★

  Ninna-ji Temple

  Kyoto's last cherries of the season — the Omuro trees bloom at eye level in mid-April, backed by a 1644 pagoda.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★★

  Nishi Hongan-ji Temple

  Free entry from 5:30, National Treasure halls, and one of Kyoto's three great pavilions — a 15-minute walk from the station.

• 

  Nature Hyogo ★★★

  Nunobiki Herb Gardens

  Japan's largest herb garden on a Rokko mountainside, with a city-and-harbour panorama that changes from morning light to evening glow.

• 

  History Kanagawa ★★★

  Odawara Castle

  Kanto's most historically significant Warring-States castle — easy stop on the Tokyo–Hakone corridor, best with the combined museum ticket.

• 

  History Shiga ★★★

  Omihachiman & Hachimanbori Canal — the merchant town on Lake Biwa

  Shiga's most atmospheric historic canal district — Edo-period dozo warehouses line the water, and boat tours let you see them from the level the Omi merchants once did.

• 

  History Saitama ★★★

  Musashi Ichinomiya Hikawa Shrine

  The oldest and most senior Kanto shrine outside Tokyo, reached along a 2 km tree-lined avenue; entry is free.

• 

  Local life Kyoto ★★★

  Pontocho — the narrow riverside alley of lanterns

  Kyoto's most atmospheric 490-metre lane — stone-paved, lantern-lit, and one block from the Kamo River.

• 

  Nature Hyogo ★★★

  Mount Rokko

  Kobe's celebrated 'ten-million-dollar' night panorama, spreading city lights and the harbour across the entire Hanshin corridor.

• 

  Culture Tokyo ★★★

  Ryogoku Kokugikan — Japan's national sumo arena

  Japan's national sport in its home arena, with a free museum inside and a surrounding neighbourhood still shaped entirely by sumo.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★★

  Saiho-ji Temple

  One of the most quietly extraordinary gardens in Japan — 120 species of moss over a UNESCO pond garden, reservation required.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★★

  Shimogamo Shrine

  A UNESCO shrine reached by walking a primeval city forest — the approach through the trees is the defining experience.

• 

  History Osaka ★★★

  Shitennoji Temple

  The oldest Buddhist temple complex layout in Japan — calm grounds, a recognisable pagoda, and a lively monthly market on the 21st.

• 

  Entertainment Osaka ★★★

  teamLab Botanical Garden Osaka

  teamLab's most distinctive Japanese venue — digital art set inside a real living botanical garden, outdoors, after dark.

• 

  Entertainment Tokyo ★★★

  teamLab Planets TOKYO — a barefoot walk through water and light

  Barefoot, water, digital light all around you — Guinness's most-visited museum devoted to a single art group, and the reason is clear once you're inside.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★★

  To-ji Temple

  Japan's tallest wooden pagoda, minutes from Kyoto Station — and a famous monthly flea market on the 21st.

• 

  Local life Tokyo ★★★

  Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building — the city's best free panorama

  Tokyo's best free viewpoint: 202 m, south deck open until 22:00, clear-day Fuji views — no tickets, no queue.

• 

  History Nara ★★★

  Tōshōdai-ji Temple

  A Nara-period golden hall that a blind Chinese monk built after six sea crossings — one of Japan's most intact eighth-century temples.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★★

  Ujigami Shrine

  Japan's oldest shrine building — the Heian-period main hall stands free to enter, quietly set in its wooded hillside above the Uji River.

• 

  Local life Osaka ★★★

  Umeda Sky Building — the open-air rooftop at 173 m

  Osaka's most dramatic observation point — the open-air cross-tower escalator and 360-degree rooftop at 173 m, open until 22:30 for night views.

• 

  History Wakayama ★★★

  Wakayama Castle

  Seat of the Kishu Tokugawa — one of Japan's three senior shogun-producing clans — with a rare slanted covered bridge and a garden that frames the keep beautifully in blossom season.

• 

  History Nara ★★★

  Yakushi-ji Temple

  Japan's most celebrated surviving eighth-century pagoda — 1,300 years old, side by side with its 1981 reconstruction.

• 

  History Tokyo ★★★

  Zojo-ji Temple

  Tokyo's oldest wooden gate, the Tokugawa shoguns buried behind the main hall, and Tokyo Tower framing everything above the roof.

• 

  History Tochigi ★★★

  Nikko Toshogu and the Yomeimon gate — the shrine where Ieyasu became a god

  1,600 yen, 9:00 opening, 508 carvings on a single gate — Nikko's World Heritage shrine, best walked in order from the pagoda up.

• 

  Onsen Gunma ★★★

  Kusatsu Onsen's Yubatake — hot spring running through open wooden channels

  4,000 litres a minute at pH 2.1, running through seven wooden channels in the open — free, always open, best at dawn or after dark.

• 

  Nature Kyoto ★★★

  Amanohashidate — the pine sandbar across Miyazu Bay

  One of Japan's Three Scenic Views, and the only one you can walk across — a 3.6 km pine sandbar on Kyoto's sea coast, two hours north of the city.

• 

  Nature Saitama ★★★

  Nagatoro — rock terraces and a pole-steered boat

  Rock terraces of exposed deep-earth schist, and a wooden boat poled through the rapids beside them — two hours from Ikebukuro.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★★

  Sanzen-in — Ōhara's moss garden and hidden jizo

  A moss garden you walk onto, a thousand-year-old Amida hall standing in the middle of it, and stone children hidden at your feet.

• 

  Nature Tokyo ★★★

  Jingu Gaien Ginkgo Avenue

  146 ginkgo planted in graded heights so the avenue looks longer than it is — Tokyo's best-known autumn street, and a designed illusion.

• 

  History Osaka ★★★

  Nintoku Mausoleum

  The largest tomb on earth by footprint, and you will never see its shape — the visit is a wall of trees across water, and a plan you carry in your head.

• 

  Culture Tokyo ★★★

  The National Art Center

  Japan's largest gallery floor, owning nothing — a museum built to be emptied and refilled, with a free atrium under a rippling glass wall.

• 

  Food Osaka ★★★

  Tsuruhashi — grill smoke and Japan's largest Korea Town

  A post-war black market that was roofed over instead of cleared away, and Japan's largest Korea Town fifteen minutes' walk from it.

• 

  Local life Tokyo ★★★

  Ueno Zoo

  Japan's first zoo, opened 1882, inside Ueno Park and a five-minute walk from the museums — cheap, closed Mondays, best on a weekday morning.

• 

  Local life Tokyo ★★★

  Odaiba — a Statue of Liberty facing Tokyo Bay

  An 11-metre Statue of Liberty with the Rainbow Bridge behind her — free, best at dusk, reached on a driverless train that crosses the bridge on the way in.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★★

  Yasaka Shrine

  Head shrine of every Gion shrine in Japan, origin of the Gion Matsuri, main hall a National Treasure — open all night, free, and empty at dawn.

• 

  History Mie ★★★

  Meoto Iwa — two rocks tied together off Ise

  Two rocks joined by a sacred rope, acting as a gate onto a stone beneath the sea — the sun rises through the gap from May to July, and Fuji sometimes appears behind it.

• 

  History Tokyo ★★★

  National Museum of Nature and Science

  Japan's national science museum, founded 1877 — dinosaurs, a blue whale on the forecourt, and Hachiko himself. Three hours, cheap, closed Mondays.

• 

  Local life Tokyo ★★★

  Kabukicho — Japan's biggest entertainment district

  Japan's biggest entertainment district, named for a kabuki theatre that was never built — go after dark, stay on the lit streets, and ignore the touts.

• 

  Local life Tokyo ★★★

  Ginza — the silver mint turned shopping street

  Japan's most expensive shopping street, named after a coin mint — free to walk, closed to cars on weekend afternoons, and full of free art galleries.

• 

  History Mie ★★★

  Ise Jingu Geku — the outer shrine you should visit first

  The half of Ise Jingu that visitors skip and the priests do first — five minutes from the station, free, and quieter than the Inner Shrine.

• 

  Nature Nara ★★★

  Mount Wakakusa

  A three-tiered hill of pure grass above Nara Park — 30 minutes up, deer the whole way, and Todaiji's Great Buddha Hall seen from above.

• 

  History Kanagawa ★★★

  Yamashita Park and the Hikawa Maru — a 1930 liner moored at the seafront

  A harbour park reclaimed with rubble from the 1923 earthquake, with a 1930 liner moored to it that survived three mines and is now an Important Cultural Property.

• 

  History Tokyo ★★★

  National Museum of Western Art

  A Le Corbusier building that is Tokyo's only World Heritage site, built because France required it before returning a confiscated collection — and the Rodins outside are free.

• 

  History Saitama ★★★

  Mitsumine Shrine

  A Chichibu mountain shrine guarded by stone wolves instead of lion-dogs, above 1,000 metres — one bus route, five times a day, no ropeway since 2007.

• 

  History Kanagawa ★★★

  Hasedera — a temple of a nine-metre Kannon

  A 9.18-metre wooden Kannon, a hydrangea slope over Sagami Bay and a candle-lit cave — five minutes from the Kamakura Great Buddha and usually walked past.

• 

  Local life Tokyo ★★★

  Omotesando — a shrine approach turned shopping street

  Tokyo's flagship boutique avenue is a shrine approach — zelkova trees set the scale, and even Tadao Ando's building was held to three storeys to stay under them.

• 

  Local life Osaka ★★★

  Shinsaibashi-suji — the covered street that runs into Dotonbori

  Osaka's main covered shopping street, trading since the Edo period, running under a roof straight into Dotonbori and the Glico sign.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★★

  The Yasaka Pagoda

  The 46-metre pagoda that closes every Higashiyama photograph — rebuilt in 1440, and the only Important Cultural Property pagoda in Japan you can climb inside.

• 

  Local life Hyogo ★★★

  Kobe Port Tower

  A 108-metre hand-drum silhouette made of 32 steel pipes, the world's first pipe-structure tower — reopened in April 2024 with an open rooftop deck over the harbour.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★★

  Kenninji — a quiet Zen temple in Gion

  Kyoto's oldest Zen temple, founded 1202, standing where Gion's Hanamikoji runs out — with ceiling dragons painted in 2002 and a facsimile of Sotatsu's famous screen.

• 

  Local life Osaka ★★★

  Hozenji Yokocho — a stone lane behind Dotonbori

  A lantern-lit stone lane one street behind Dotonbori, with a Fudo statue so watered by visitors that it is entirely green — burned twice, rebuilt twice.

• 

  Food Miyazaki ★★★

  Chicken Nanban — Nobeoka's fried chicken in sweet vinegar

  The birthplace of a dish the whole country eats, plus the valley's own produce hall on the way.

• 

  Food Fukui ★★★

  Echizen Snow Crab

  The crab's own front door — museum, market hall and a sea bath on one roadside site.

• 

  Food Fukuoka ★★★

  Hakata Tonkotsu Ramen

  The riverside stall row in Nakasu, where the bowl and the city meet in the open air.

• 

  Food Gifu ★★★

  Hida Beef — Gifu's black-haired wagyu brand

  Gifu's wagyu brand, reached on foot from a riverside market that is gone by midday.

• 

  Food Hiroshima ★★★

  Hiroshima Okonomiyaki

  A building of griddle counters, each shop cooking the same dish its own way.

• 

  Food Hiroshima ★★★

  Hiroshima Oysters

  Grilled oysters handed over at the counter, on the road between the pier and the shrine.

• 

  Food Kagoshima ★★★

  Kagoshima Kurobuta Pork

  The prefecture's signature pork, searchable on foot within a few roofed blocks.

• 

  Food Akita ★★★

  Kiritanpo — Akita's grilled rice sticks, simmered in chicken hotpot

  Akita's harvest hotpot, bought part by part in a market that opens at five.

• 

  Food Fukushima ★★★

  Kitakata Ramen — The storehouse town's breakfast noodle

  Soy-sauce ramen with a flat aged noodle, eaten the way the town eats it — early.

• 

  Food Kumamoto ★★★

  Kumamoto Basashi — Raw horse, sliced thin and eaten cold

  Kumamoto's raw horse, on an open lane under the castle walls.

• 

  Food Mie ★★★

  Matsusaka Beef — Mie's long-fattened wagyu and the town behind it

  Japan's most famous wagyu, with a walkable merchant town attached.

• 

  Food Fukuoka ★★★

  Karashi Mentaiko — Fukuoka's chilli-cured pollock roe

  Fukuoka's signature roe, bought where the city's cooks buy it.

• 

  Food Miyazaki ★★★

  Miyazaki Wagyu Beef

  The prefecture's own shop — the calmest place to see what the brand really covers.

• 

  Food Nagasaki ★★★

  Nagasaki Champon — Pork, seafood and vegetables in one noodle bowl

  Champon where it was invented, in a quarter small enough to cross on foot.

• 

  Craft Iwate ★★★

  Nambu Ironware — Morioka and Oshu cast ironware

  A free walk through a working Nambu iron foundry, from sand mould to finished kettle.

• 

  Food Okinawa ★★★

  Okinawa Soba — Wheat noodles in a pork and bonito broth

  The island's daily bowl, eaten one floor above the stalls that supply it.

• 

  Food Shiga ★★★

  Omi Beef

  Omi beef over a counter, with Yoshitsune's post village on the same walk.

• 

  Food Hokkaido ★★★

  Sapporo Miso Ramen

  Seventeen ramen kitchens in one lane — the city's signature bowl, all in one place.

• 

  Food Kagoshima ★★★

  Satsuma Shochu — Kagoshima's sweet-potato spirit

  A working Meiji-era shochu kura at the southern tip of Kagoshima, free to enter, tasting included.

• 

  Food Miyagi ★★★

  Sendai Grilled Beef Tongue — Miyagi's postwar dish, served as a set

  Sendai's signature dish, on a street built for it inside the station.

• 

  Food Shizuoka ★★★

  Shizuoka Green Tea

  The tea plateau's only front door, with Enshu's tea room behind it.

• 

  Food Kochi ★★★

  Tosa Katsuo Tataki — Bonito seared over a rice-straw fire

  Straw-seared bonito, cooked in the open at the port that lands it.

• 

  Food Aomori ★★★

  Tsugaru Apples — Aomori's apple country at a city-run orchard park

  A free municipal orchard, open daily, with Mount Iwaki at the end of every row.

• 

  Food Niigata ★★★

  Uonuma Koshihikari Rice

  A counter inside Japan's most famous rice district, where the rice is sold and cooked on the spot.

• 

  Food Tochigi ★★★

  Utsunomiya Gyoza

  Several of the city's gyoza shops, side by side under one roof.

• 

  Food Yamagata ★★★

  Yamagata Cherries

  Japan's cherry country, with the fruit sold, explained and picked in one stop.

• 

  Food Hokkaido ★★★

  Yubari Melon

  Japan's most famous melon, bought where the co-operative grades it.

• 

  Culture Aichi ★★★

  Atsuta Jingu — Nagoya's shrine of the sacred sword

  One of the three imperial regalia, in a forest you can walk before the city wakes.

• 

  Nature Ishikawa ★★★

  Chirihama Nagisa Driveway — A public road laid on wet sand

  A beach that is also a public road, open only when the sea allows.

• 

  Culture Fukui ★★★

  Fukui Prefectural Dinosaur Museum

  The dinosaurs of this valley, mounted and standing under one dome.

• 

  Onsen Gifu ★★★

  Gero Onsen — one of Japan's three great hot springs

  One of Japan's three great springs, with public baths open to day visitors.

• 

  History Toyama ★★★

  Ainokura Gassho Village — A World Heritage hamlet of steep thatched roofs

  A World Heritage village that is still a street people live on.

• 

  Local life Gifu ★★★

  Gujo Hachiman — A castle town laid out around its water channels

  A working water town where the lanes, not the sights, are the reason to come.

• 

  Local life Ishikawa ★★★

  Higashi Chaya District — Kanazawa's largest teahouse quarter

  A whole teahouse town, kept as one piece of street.

• 

  History Aichi ★★★

  Inuyama Castle

  A National Treasure keep on a river bluff, with a gallery round its top floor.

• 

  Culture Ishikawa ★★★

  21st Century Museum of Contemporary Art — Kanazawa's circle of glass on the lawn

  A museum with a free half that stays open until late.

• 

  Nature Ishikawa ★★★

  Kenrokuen Garden

  Japan's most famous strolling garden, and it is free for the two hours before it opens.

• 

  Nature Niigata ★★★

  Kiyotsu Gorge Tunnel

  Columnar cliffs seen from inside the rock, ending in a pool that mirrors the whole gorge.

• 

  Nature Aichi ★★★

  Korankei Gorge

  Central Japan's best-known maple valley, planted by one monk a tree at a time.

• 

  Nature Toyama ★★★

  Kurobe Gorge Railway

  A working hydro railway that still lets passengers ride in the open air.

• 

  History Gifu ★★★

  Magome-juku — A stone-paved post town on the Nakasendo

  One stone street up a ridge, closed to cars for the best hours of the day.

• 

  History Aichi ★★★

  Museum Meiji-Mura — Relocated Meiji-era architecture, out in the open

  Rescued Meiji buildings on a hillside, with a working steam train running through them.

• 

  History Ishikawa ★★★

  Myoryuji Temple — The Kanazawa temple nicknamed Ninja-dera

  A defensive temple of trapdoors and hidden stairs — no phone booking, no entry.

• 

  History Aichi ★★★

  Nagoya Castle

  The keep is shut, but the rebuilt palace and the Edo turrets earn the morning.

• 

  Food Ishikawa ★★★

  Omicho Market

  Kanazawa's covered market — go on a weekday morning, before the aisles fill.

• 

  History Niigata ★★★

  Sado Island — Japan Sea island of the shogunate's gold mines

  A World Heritage mine, a shipwrights' village and tub boats, all on one island an hour offshore.

• 

  History Gifu ★★★

  Shirakawa-go Gassho Village — Gifu's World Heritage thatched hamlet

  A World Heritage village still lived in, on a bus you have to book.

• 

  Nature Ishikawa ★★★

  Shiroyone Senmaida — Rice terraces stepping into the Sea of Japan

  A working field shaped by the coast, best in the last hour of light.

• 

  History Gifu ★★★

  Takayama Sanmachi Old Town — Hida's preserved merchant quarter

  A preserved merchant quarter that still trades, best walked before nine.

• 

  Nature Toyama ★★★

  Tateyama Kurobe Alpine Route

  A spring road cut through the snow rather than cleared off it.

• 

  Nature Fukui ★★★

  Tojinbo Cliffs — Columnar sea cliffs on the Sakai coast

  Columnar cliffs you can walk out onto, with a boat along the base.

• 

  Culture Aichi ★★★

  Toyota Commemorative Museum of Industry and Technology

  Working looms and engines in the brick mill where the group began.

• 

  Nature Kagoshima ★★★

  Amami Oshima — Kagoshima's World Heritage subtropical island

  A free government centre in the mangroves that explains the whole World Heritage island.

• 

  History Miyazaki ★★★

  Amanoiwato Shrine — The cave where the sun goddess hid, in Takachiho

  The rare shrine whose sacred object is a cave you are walked out to see.

• 

  Culture Miyazaki ★★★

  Aoshima Shrine — An island shrine ringed by wave-cut rock

  A whole island serving as one shrine, with a rock shelf that changes by the hour.

• 

  Nature Kumamoto ★★★

  Kusasenri Plain — A grass-floored old crater below Mount Aso's active vent

  Open grassland under a live volcano, reachable even when the crater is not.

• 

  History Kagoshima ★★★

  Chiran — Samurai lanes and the kamikaze memorial museum

  A preserved samurai street and a kamikaze memorial in the same town, on one bus line.

• 

  Nature Kumamoto ★★★

  Daikanbo Lookout — The high point of Aso's northern caldera rim

  The one view that shows you how large the Aso caldera really is.

• 

  Nature Miyazaki ★★★

  Ebino Kogen — A crater-lake plateau in the Kirishima range

  Three crater lakes on one short trail, inside a range that is still live.

• 

  Onsen Kagoshima ★★★

  Ibusuki Sunamushi Sand Bath

  Buried in beach sand heated by the spring running under it — ten minutes and you are done.

• 

  History Kagoshima ★★★

  Kirishima Jingu — A vermilion national treasure in the mountains

  A national treasure in full lacquer and colour, quietest on the first bus of the day.

• 

  History Kumamoto ★★★

  Kumamoto Castle

  A famous keep, plus the rare chance to walk a castle mid-repair.

• 

  Onsen Kumamoto ★★★

  Kurokawa Onsen

  A hot-spring village that runs its open-air baths as one shared attraction.

• 

  Nature Saga ★★★

  Mifuneyama Rakuen — A daimyo's cliffside stroll garden in Takeo

  A daimyo's garden with a bare cliff for its back wall.

• 

  Nature Kumamoto ★★★

  Nabegataki Falls

  A 20-metre curtain of water you can stand behind, entered by booked time slot.

• 

  Nature Saga ★★★

  Niji no Matsubara — A million black pines along Karatsu Bay

  A working windbreak that turned into one of Japan's great landscapes, free to walk.

• 

  History Kumamoto ★★★

  Sakitsu Village — Amakusa's Hidden Christian fishing settlement

  A World Heritage fishing village where church, shrine and working boats share one street.

• 

  Nature Kagoshima ★★★

  Sakurajima — The working volcano across the bay from the city

  A live volcano reached on a city ferry, with a free foot bath at the foot of it.

• 

  History Kagoshima ★★★

  Sengan-en — The Shimazu lords' garden with Sakurajima borrowed in

  A garden that borrows an active volcano, with a World Heritage furnace in the grounds.

• 

  Nature Miyazaki ★★★

  Takachiho Gorge

  Japan's signature gorge — the promenade is free, and only the boat needs booking.

• 

  Nature Miyazaki ★★★

  Cape Toi — Miyazaki's southern cape and its wild native horses

  Japan's native horses living outdoors on a cape you can drive into.

• 

  History Kumamoto ★★★

  Tsujun Bridge — A National Treasure stone aqueduct in the Kumamoto hills

  An Edo-period stone aqueduct that still irrigates, and flushes itself in two long jets.

• 

  History Miyazaki ★★★

  Udo Jingu — A shrine built inside a sea cave

  A vermilion hall inside a sea cave, reached by walking down rather than up.

• 

  Nature Kagoshima ★★★

  Shiratani Unsuikyo — Yakushima's moss forest and cedar trails

  Yakushima's ancient cedar forest on a graded trail — an hour, or the whole day.

• 

  History Saga ★★★

  Yoshinogari Historical Park — Reconstructed Yayoi-period moated settlement

  The Yayoi age rebuilt on the ground it was excavated from.

• 

  Onsen Ehime ★★★

  Dogo Onsen Honkan

  An Important Cultural Property you actually bathe in, calmest in the first hour of the day.

• 

  Entertainment Aichi ★★★

  Ghibli's Grand Warehouse — The indoor core of Ghibli Park in Aichi

  Ghibli Park's only indoor area, and the only one with a timed entry slot.

• 

  Nature Ehime ★★★

  Mount Ishizuchi

  Western Japan's highest peak, with ascetics' chains on the rock and a bypass beside each.

• 

  History Ehime ★★★

  Matsuyama Castle

  An original keep, and a hilltop plaza that opens before the ropeway does.

• 

  Nature Ehime ★★★

  Shimanami Kaido — The island-hopping cycle road out of Imabari

  The Shikoku gateway of the ride, with a free hall right under the bridge.

• 

  History Ehime ★★★

  Uchiko Yokaichi-Gokoku Historic District

  Shikoku's first preserved townscape, and its ochre plaster walls look like nowhere else.

• 

  History Iwate ★★★

  Chusonji Konjikido — The Golden Hall of the Fujiwara lords at Hiraizumi

  A gold-leafed hall at the top of a cedar approach, open every day of the year.

• 

  Nature Iwate ★★★

  Geibikei Gorge

  Limestone walls seen from a hand-poled boat, with the boatman's song on the way back.

• 

  Onsen Yamagata ★★★

  Ginzan Onsen — A wooden inn street in the Yamagata hills

  A gaslit street of wooden inns, reached by city bus and worth walking twice in a day.

• 

  Nature Fukushima ★★★

  Goshikinuma Ponds

  Eight ponds, no two the same colour, on a four-kilometre walk with buses at both ends.

• 

  History Yamagata ★★★

  Haguro-san Five-Story Pagoda

  An unpainted National Treasure alone among ancient cedars, at the pilgrim path's start.

• 

  Nature Iwate ★★★

  Jodogahama — White rhyolite spires on the Sanriku coast

  White rock, dark pines and flat water, a short bus ride out of Miyako.

• 

  History Akita ★★★

  Kakunodate Samurai District

  A whole Edo samurai street, free to walk, fifteen minutes from a bullet-train stop.

• 

  Nature Akita ★★★

  Lake Tazawa

  Japan's deepest lake, with a bus timetabled to stop at its two best points.

• 

  Nature Yamagata ★★★

  Mogami Gorge Boat Ride

  A scheduled boat down a river gorge, running every day of the year, singing included.

• 

  History Iwate ★★★

  Motsuji Temple

  A Heian garden that survived the temple it was built for.

• 

  Onsen Akita ★★★

  Nyuto Onsenkyo — Seven inns, each with its own spring

  Seven mountain inns on one bus line, each with a different water.

• 

  History Fukushima ★★★

  Ouchi-juku — A thatched post town on the old Shimotsuke Kaido

  An Edo post town kept whole by its own residents, best with a bowl of onion soba.

• 

  Nature Iwate ★★★

  Ryusendo Cave

  Underground lakes whose blue reads as depth, not reflection.

• 

  History Fukushima ★★★

  Tsuruga Castle

  A rebuilt keep worth going inside: the museum carries the Boshin War.

• 

  History Yamagata ★★★

  Yamadera Risshakuji — The cliff temple above the Tachiya valley

  A cliff temple you climb rather than visit, and the first hour after opening is the one to take.

• 

  Nature Miyagi ★★★

  Okama Crater Lake — The Zao volcano's green summit pool

  A green crater lake you reach on foot from a car park, for roughly half the year only.

• 

  Onsen Yamagata ★★★

  Zao Onsen and the Snow Monsters

  Strongly acidic sulphur water in the lanes, a plateau of ice-cased firs above them.

• 

  Nature Yamaguchi ★★★

  Akiyoshido Cave — Limestone cavern beneath the Akiyoshidai plateau

  Walk in from the valley and come out on the plateau by elevator.

• 

  History Yamaguchi ★★★

  Hagi Castle Town

  An Edo map of this town still works as a walking map.

• 

  History Hiroshima ★★★

  Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park

  Be at the museum when it opens, then walk the axis north and end at the Dome.

• 

  History Hiroshima ★★★

  Itsukushima Shrine — The shrine built out over the tide on Miyajima

  Halls built out over a tidal flat, walked before the day boats land.

• 

  Food Yamaguchi ★★★

  Karato Market — Shimonoseki's fish market with weekend sushi stalls

  Japan's pufferfish capital, with weekend sushi sold piece by piece over the counter.

• 

  History Yamaguchi ★★★

  Kintaikyo Bridge — Iwakuni's five-arched wooden bridge

  Cross it on foot, then look up at how the arches are joined.

• 

  History Okayama ★★★

  Kurashiki Bikan Historical Quarter

  Edo storehouses along a canal, free to walk by day or after dark.

• 

  Culture Tottori ★★★

  Mizuki Shigeru Road — Sakaiminato's street of yokai statues

  A whole street of folklore monsters in bronze — free, flat and walkable.

• 

  Culture Yamaguchi ★★★

  Motonosumi Shrine

  A hundred and more red gates dropping to the sea, at a shrine younger than it looks.

• 

  Nature Okayama ★★★

  Okayama Korakuen Garden

  One of Japan's three great gardens, built on open lawn with a black castle in the frame.

• 

  History Hiroshima ★★★

  Okunoshima — Hiroshima's rabbit island and former poison gas plant

  A rabbit island that was kept off the map, and the museum that says why.

• 

  History Yamaguchi ★★★

  Rurikoji Five-Storied Pagoda

  A national treasure pagoda in a park that never closes, floodlit late into the evening.

• 

  Nature Hiroshima ★★★

  Sandankyo Gorge

  A Special Place of Scenic Beauty, on one bus from central Hiroshima.

• 

  Local life Hiroshima ★★★

  Tomonoura — The Edo-era tide-waiting port south of Fukuyama

  Three national designations in one small port — walk it from the temple to the lantern.

• 

  Nature Yamaguchi ★★★

  Tsunoshima Ohashi Bridge

  A free island road built low on purpose, with the view designed into it.

• 

  History Hiroshima ★★★

  Yamato Museum

  A one-tenth battleship five minutes from the station, in a museum the city rebuilt for 2026.

• 

  Nature Kagawa ★★★

  Angel Road — A tidal sandbar out to the islets off Shodoshima

  Free, unfenced, and only there when the tide allows it.

• 

  Culture Kagawa ★★★

  Benesse House Museum

  The island's first museum, open at eight — hours before the day boats arrive.

• 

  Nature Kagawa ★★★

  Chichibugahama Beach

  The reflection runs to a timetable, and the timetable is public.

• 

  Culture Tokushima ★★★

  Iya Kazurabashi — The woven-vine footbridge of the Iya valley

  Woven vine underfoot, and the river showing through every step.

• 

  History Kagawa ★★★

  Kotohira-gu Shrine — The sea-god shrine at the top of a long stone staircase

  Free, open air, and the climb itself is the sight.

• 

  Nature Tokushima ★★★

  Naruto Whirlpools — Seen from the walkway inside the bridge

  Stand directly over the current, on a floor with glass in it.

• 

  Nature Tokushima ★★★

  Oboke and Koboke Gorges — Schist canyon on the Yoshino River

  Folded blue-green schist at eye level, from a boat that turns and comes back.

• 

  Culture Tokushima ★★★

  Otsuka Museum of Art

  Copies, not originals — which is exactly why you can get close and photograph them.

• 

  Nature Kagawa ★★★

  Ritsurin Garden

  A three-star garden that opens near sunrise and closes after dark.

• 

  Culture Kagawa ★★★

  Teshima Art Museum

  One room, one work, and the weather is on the work's side.

• 

  Local life Okinawa ★★★

  Bise Fukugi Tree Road

  A living Okinawan hamlet whose streets run under its own windbreak.

• 

  Nature Okinawa ★★★

  Cape Zanpa — Yomitan's clifftop cape and climbable lighthouse

  A climbable lighthouse on an open limestone cliff, in a park that never closes.

• 

  Local life Okinawa ★★★

  Hateruma Island — Japan's southernmost inhabited island

  The last inhabited island going south, with a cliff at one end and a white beach at the other.

• 

  Nature Okinawa ★★★

  Cape Higashi-Hennazaki — Miyako's eastern spit and climbable lighthouse

  A coral spit with the sea on both sides, and a lighthouse you can climb at the end of it.

• 

  History Okinawa ★★★

  Himeyuri Peace Museum

  The survivors built this themselves, and it still speaks in their voices.

• 

  Nature Okinawa ★★★

  Iriomote Island

  A World Heritage island explained first, by the people who protect it.

• 

  Local life Okinawa ★★★

  Ishigaki Island

  One hall where every Yaeyama boat leaves — the working start of the islands.

• 

  History Okinawa ★★★

  Katsuren Castle Ruins

  A World Heritage gusuku where the climb, not the masonry, is the point.

• 

  Local life Okinawa ★★★

  Kokusai-dori — Naha's mile-long main street

  The street everyone walks, plus the market lanes behind it that most people miss.

• 

  Nature Okinawa ★★★

  Kouri Island and Kouri Bridge

  A free road bridge out to a small northern island, with reef water on both sides.

• 

  Nature Okinawa ★★★

  Cape Manzamo — Onna's clifftop lawn above the East China Sea

  Okinawa's signature sea cliff, with a lawn on top and the light best late in the day.

• 

  Entertainment Okinawa ★★★

  Mihama American Village — Chatan's seaside shopping and entertainment quarter

  Okinawa's American-themed waterfront quarter, best walked from late afternoon into the evening.

• 

  History Okinawa ★★★

  Nakijin Castle Ruins

  Ryukyu stonework left as a ruin, on a ridge facing the sea.

• 

  Entertainment Okinawa ★★★

  Okinawa Churaumi Aquarium

  Whale sharks and manta rays in one of the world's largest tanks, on the north coast.

• 

  Nature Okinawa ★★★

  Okinawa World — Gyokusendo limestone cave and a Ryukyu culture park

  A real limestone cave under a park built to show it off.

• 

  Culture Okinawa ★★★

  Sefa-utaki — The Ryukyu kingdom's highest sacred site

  Okinawa's holiest ground, facing the island where the kingdom said the gods landed.

• 

  History Okinawa ★★★

  Shurijo Castle Park

  A World Heritage castle rebuilt in public view — a sight that ends when the hall opens.

• 

  Local life Okinawa ★★★

  Taketomi Island — Red-tile village on white coral sand, off Ishigaki

  A whole village of red tile and white coral sand, still lived in today.

• 

  Nature Okinawa ★★★

  Yonaha Maehama Beach

  Okinawa's most-named white sand, with Kurima Island square in front of it.

• 

  History Hokkaido ★★★

  Abashiri Prison Museum

  Meiji-era prison buildings you can walk inside, held as national cultural properties.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★★

  Mount Asahidake

  Hokkaido's highest volcano, with a ropeway straight into the alpine zone.

• 

  Entertainment Hokkaido ★★★

  Asahiyama Zoo

  Japan's northernmost zoo, built so the animals are seen moving.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★★

  Cape Kamui

  A ridge walk with the sea on both sides, free to enter when the gates allow.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★★

  Farm Tomita — Furano's lavender farm, free to enter

  Free to enter, open all year, and deepest purple in high summer.

• 

  History Hokkaido ★★★

  Goryokaku Fort

  A star fort you can walk for free from first light.

• 

  Food Hokkaido ★★★

  Hakodate Morning Market

  About 250 seafood stalls, one minute from the station platform.

• 

  Onsen Hokkaido ★★★

  Jozankei Onsen

  A hot-spring gorge inside Sapporo, with free footbaths and a direct bus.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★★

  Kushiro Shitsugen National Park

  Japan's largest wetland, from a free deck you can walk to from a station.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★★

  Lake Akan

  The one lake in Japan with protected marimo, and a free centre that explains them.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★★

  Lake Mashu

  A caldera lake with no inlet and no outlet, read from the rim above.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★★

  Lake Shikotsu

  A clear caldera lake inside a national park, reached on one bus.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★★

  Lake Toya

  The lake only makes sense once you have seen the volcano museum.

• 

  Culture Hokkaido ★★★

  Moerenuma Park — Isamu Noguchi's land art on Sapporo's edge

  A whole park designed as one sculpture, and you walk on top of it.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★★

  Mount Hakodate — Hakodate's night view from the summit

  A short ropeway to the view that made this port city famous.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★★

  Mount Moiwa — The ropeway summit above southwest Sapporo

  Ride up before sunset and watch the city switch from view to lights.

• 

  Local life Hokkaido ★★★

  Niseko — Hokkaido's four-season highland resort under Mount Yotei

  The valley's front door — maps, farm produce and Mount Yotei in one yard.

• 

  Onsen Hokkaido ★★★

  Noboribetsu Jigokudani — The steaming crater above Noboribetsu Onsen

  Stand in the crater that heats one of Japan's great spa towns.

• 

  Local life Hokkaido ★★★

  Odori Park

  A firebreak that became a park, and the front room of the snow festival.

• 

  History Hokkaido ★★★

  Otaru Canal

  A free harbour walk that changes completely between afternoon and lamplight.

• 

  History Hokkaido ★★★

  Sapporo Clock Tower

  A pioneer-era drill hall still running its Howard clock, ten minutes from the station.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★★

  Shikisai-no-oka — A banded flower garden on the Biei hills

  A hillside planted in bands, so the slope itself does the composing.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★★

  Shiretoko Five Lakes

  The rules here are the point: they tell you whose forest this is.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★★

  Shirogane Blue Pond

  A short walk beside water that a flood-control dam turned blue by accident.

• 

  Food Hokkaido ★★★

  Shiroi Koibito Park — Ishiya's confectionery park in west Sapporo

  A real production line you can watch, wrapped in a brick garden town.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★★

  Sounkyo Gorge

  Stop where the road wants you to keep driving.

• 

  Culture Hokkaido ★★★

  Upopoy National Ainu Museum and Park

  The one place built to show Ainu culture at full size.

• 

  Onsen Shizuoka ★★★

  Atami Onsen — A hot-spring town stacked above its own bay

  Seven marked springs through Atami's back streets, free, outdoors and open at any hour.

• 

  History Fukuoka ★★★

  Dazaifu Tenmangu — Head shrine of the Tenmangu, over Michizane's grave

  The head shrine of the god of learning, at its quietest the minute the gates open.

• 

  History Fukui ★★★

  Eihei-ji — Soto Zen's training monastery in the Fukui hills

  A working Zen monastery whose morning service is open if you phone a day ahead.

• 

  History Shizuoka ★★★

  Fujisan Hongu Sengen Taisha — Head shrine of the Sengen shrines of Mount Fuji

  The mountain's own head shrine, free and open before the traffic.

• 

  History Nagasaki ★★★

  Glover Garden — Meiji-era Western houses on a harbour hillside

  Nine period houses on one slope, and the route runs downhill the whole way.

• 

  History Nagasaki ★★★

  Gunkanjima — Nagasaki's abandoned coal-mining island

  A mined-out island you can actually walk on, on the days the sea allows it.

• 

  Entertainment Nagasaki ★★★

  Huis Ten Bosch — A full-scale Dutch town rebuilt as a theme park

  A whole Dutch town you can walk, and it changes character after dark.

• 

  Nature Nagano ★★★

  Jigokudani Monkey Park

  Read the monkey forecast first, then walk it.

• 

  Nature Nagano ★★★

  Kappa Bridge — The wooden span at the heart of Kamikochi

  Cross it, then keep walking upstream.

• 

  Local life Nagano ★★★

  Karuizawa — A cool-summer town in the Asama highlands

  The one resort town where the shopping street is also the historical exhibit.

• 

  Nature Nagasaki ★★★

  Kujukushima Islands — Sasebo's island-studded arm of Saikai National Park

  A national-park bay of wooded islets, seen from the water and from the ridge above.

• 

  History Shizuoka ★★★

  Kunozan Toshogu — Tokugawa Ieyasu's first burial shrine above Suruga Bay

  The original Toshogu — Ieyasu's grave, a National Treasure hall, and Suruga Bay below.

• 

  Culture Fukuoka ★★★

  Kushida Shrine — Hakata's tutelary shrine and its festival float

  A city shrine open from four in the morning, with a festival float inside.

• 

  History Nagano ★★★

  Matsumoto Castle

  Buy the ticket at opening, then walk the moat afterwards.

• 

  Nature Shizuoka ★★★

  Miho no Matsubara — A black-pine coast facing Mount Fuji

  One of Japan's three great pine groves, free and open, with Fuji across the bay.

• 

  Culture Fukuoka ★★★

  Miyajidake Shrine — The Fukutsu shrine of the Path of Light

  Come for the shrine and the forest loop; treat the sunset as a bonus.

• 

  History Fukuoka ★★★

  Mojiko Retro — Kitakyushu's preserved harbour quarter

  A whole port quarter of early-modern buildings, walkable from the platform.

• 

  Nature Gifu ★★★

  Monet's Pond — Gifu's nameless spring-fed pond

  A nameless irrigation pond worth timing for the morning light.

• 

  Nature Nagasaki ★★★

  Mount Inasa Observatory

  Take the later car and you get the same view with room at the rail.

• 

  Culture Gifu ★★★

  Nagara River Cormorant Fishing

  A licensed night fishery worked by firelight, watched from a boat that drifts alongside.

• 

  History Nagasaki ★★★

  Nagasaki Peace Park

  Two grounds, one argument: walk up from the hypocentre, not down from the statue.

• 

  History Nagano ★★★

  Narai-juku — A preserved post town in the Kiso valley

  One kilometre of street with nothing modern cut into it — walk the whole thing.

• 

  Nature Shizuoka ★★★

  Mount Omuro — Izu's grass cinder cone, climbed by chairlift

  A crater you can walk right round, reached by chairlift.

• 

  Culture Nagasaki ★★★

  Oura Cathedral

  Japan's oldest church, and the room where the hidden Christians came forward.

• 

  Onsen Nagano ★★★

  Shibu Onsen — Bathhouses behind locked doors on one stone street

  Nine doors, one key, and the last of them opens for everyone.

• 

  Nature Gifu ★★★

  Shinhotaka Ropeway

  Japan's only two-storey gondola, and an Alpine viewing deck you reach in shoes, not boots.

• 

  Nature Shizuoka ★★★

  Shiraito Falls

  Spring water leaving a lava cliff in countless threads, inside the Mount Fuji World Heritage property.

• 

  Onsen Shizuoka ★★★

  Shuzenji Onsen

  A famous spa town whose best parts are free to walk.

• 

  History Nagano ★★★

  Suwa Taisha Shimosha — The two lower shrines of a four-shrine complex

  Four shrines, no inner sanctuary, and a god that moves house.

• 

  History Nagano ★★★

  Togakushi Shrine — A mountain sanctuary at the end of a cedar avenue

  Walk it, do not just look at it — the avenue only works at the pace of feet.

• 

  History Nagano ★★★

  Tsumago-juku — Japan's first preserved post town

  The first street in Japan saved by the people living on it.

• 

  Onsen Nagasaki ★★★

  Unzen Jigoku — A geothermal hell field in Japan's first national park

  Thirty steaming vents in the middle of a town, free to walk through.

• 

  Local life Fukuoka ★★★

  Yanagawa Canal Cruise — Punted boats through a castle town's moats

  An hour poled through a castle town's moats, ending at the lords' villa.

• 

  History Nagano ★★★

  Zenko-ji — A temple open to every school of Buddhism

  A national-treasure hall at the top of a street worth the walk.

• 

  Culture Shimane ★★★

  Adachi Museum of Art

  Come for the frames, not for a walk in the garden.

• 

  History Aomori ★★★

  Hirosaki Castle

  The northernmost keep in Japan, in a park that never shuts.

• 

  Food Okayama ★★★

  Hiruzen Highlands

  A national park where the protected landscape is a working pasture.

• 

  Nature Shimane ★★★

  Inasa Beach

  Izumo's sunset shore: open ground, no ticket, a short walk from the great shrine.

• 

  History Shimane ★★★

  Iwami Ginzan Silver Mine

  A World Heritage mine tunnel you walk through, at the end of a car-free valley.

• 

  History Shimane ★★★

  Izumo Taisha Grand Shrine

  Go for the etiquette and the order, not only the giant rope.

• 

  Nature Aomori ★★★

  Juniko Aoike — The cobalt pond in the Shirakami beech lakes

  The famous cobalt pond, walked as a beech-forest loop rather than a photo stop.

• 

  Nature Okinawa ★★★

  Kabira Bay

  The postcard bay, plus the reef underneath it.

• 

  Nature Aomori ★★★

  Lake Towada

  One caldera inside another, and the whole visit inside one lakeside village.

• 

  History Shimane ★★★

  Matsue Castle

  An original keep you can stand under for free, before the ticket desk opens.

• 

  Nature Miyagi ★★★

  Matsushima Bay

  One of Japan's three classic views, and you can walk out into it.

• 

  History Tottori ★★★

  Mount Daisen

  A sacred mountain you meet at its gate, not its summit.

• 

  Onsen Miyagi ★★★

  Naruko Onsen

  A cure town where the water, not the view, is the sight.

• 

  Culture Aomori ★★★

  Nebuta Museum Wa Rasse

  Full-size Nebuta floats beside the station, replaced with the year's winners each August.

• 

  History Aomori ★★★

  Mount Osore — A sulphur caldera temple, one of Japan's three sacred sites

  A working temple on the floor of a live volcano, open only half the year.

• 

  History Aomori ★★★

  Sannai-Maruyama Site — A Jomon village rebuilt on its excavated ground

  A whole Jomon village dug up and rebuilt where it stood, minutes from the Shinkansen.

• 

  Onsen Aomori ★★★

  Sukayu Onsen — The all-cypress mountain bath on Hakkoda

  A pillarless cypress bath on Hakkoda, open to day visitors, in Japan's record snow country.

• 

  Onsen Shimane ★★★

  Tamatsukuri Onsen — Matsue's riverside hot-spring town

  A hot-spring valley you can walk end to end for free, bath or no bath.

• 

  Nature Tottori ★★★

  Tottori Sand Dunes

  Japan's best-known dune field, and it never actually closes.

• 

  Local life Shimane ★★★

  Tsuwano — A samurai castle town in the San'in mountains

  Kyoto's texture without the queue, in a town you can walk.

• 

  Nature Shimane ★★★

  Yushien Garden — On the peony island in Lake Nakaumi

  A pond garden that keeps peonies in bloom in every month of the year.

• 

  Entertainment Miyagi ★★★

  Miyagi Zao Fox Village — A private fox park in the Zao foothills

  Foxes loose in a wood, and a path that goes straight through it.

• 

  History Miyagi ★★★

  Zuiganji Temple

  A National Treasure hall and kitchen, and a cave-lined approach up from the bay.

• 

  Nature Aomori ★★★

  Oirase Gorge

  A famous gorge you can take in the length you have time for.

• 

  Onsen Hyogo ★★★

  Arima Onsen — One of Japan's three oldest hot springs, above Kobe

  Two unrelated hot springs, two public baths, a few minutes apart on one lane.

• 

  Nature Kochi ★★★

  Cape Ashizuri

  A cape you walk as a circuit, not a deck you stand on.

• 

  Onsen Oita ★★★

  Hells of Beppu — Beppu's boiling springs kept as gardens to look at

  Boiling springs landscaped as gardens, best walked before the coaches arrive.

• 

  Nature Kochi ★★★

  Katsurahama Beach

  Kochi's signature shore, with a shrine on the rocks and Ryoma above the pines.

• 

  Culture Kyoto ★★★

  Kifune Shrine

  Kyoto's water-god shrine, read as a three-part walk up one valley.

• 

  Onsen Oita ★★★

  Lake Kinrin — The mist pond at the end of Yufuin's main street

  Mist on warm water at dawn, then a shopping street that wakes up.

• 

  History Kochi ★★★

  Kochi Castle

  The only castle in Japan where the palace and the keep still stand together.

• 

  Nature Oita ★★★

  Kokonoe Yume Otsurihashi — Japan's highest bridge built only for people on foot

  Japan's highest walking bridge, with two waterfalls upstream and forest far below.

• 

  Nature Osaka ★★★

  Minoo Falls

  A city waterfall you reach by walking a river gorge rather than parking beside it.

• 

  Nature Kochi ★★★

  Cape Muroto

  Sea floor pushed up into the air, with a walkway that puts you on it.

• 

  Nature Kochi ★★★

  Nikobuchi — The Niyodo Blue pool on the Edagawa River

  A river pool you are meant to look at, not swim in.

• 

  History Oita ★★★

  Oka Castle Ruins

  Walls without a castle, on a cliff, with room to walk and no queue.

• 

  Nature Kochi ★★★

  Ryugado Cave

  A Yayoi pot turned to stone where it stood — nothing else in Japan looks like it.

• 

  Nature Kochi ★★★

  Sada Chinkabashi — Longest of the Shimanto's railless bridges

  The Shimanto's longest railless crossing, and still an ordinary road

• 

  Nature Oita ★★★

  Takasakiyama Natural Zoological Garden — Wild macaque troops on a mountain, and no cages

  Wild macaques at arm's length, with a running commentary on troop politics.

• 

  History Oita ★★★

  Usa Jingu — The head shrine of Japan's Hachiman network

  Japan's Hachiman head shrine, with a second half most visitors skip.

• 

  Craft Fukushima ★★★

  Akabeko — Aizu's nodding papier-mache ox

  The red ox everyone buys, at the cliff temple its story comes from.

• 

  Culture Akita ★★★

  Akita Kanto Festival

  Four August nights on a closed avenue, and the same poles indoors the rest of the year.

• 

  Craft Mie ★★★

  Akoya Pearls — Toba's pearl island and its ama divers

  Where pearl farming was invented, and where ama still dive for visitors hourly.

• 

  Food Hokkaido ★★★

  Asahikawa Ramen

  Eight of Asahikawa's ramen kitchens under one roof, soy broth and all.

• 

  Craft Fukui ★★★

  Echizen Washi — Handmade paper from the Goka villages of Fukui

  A working paper valley where anyone can scoop a sheet, then walk to its shrine.

• 

  Food Fukuoka ★★★

  Fukuoka Yatai — Licensed street stalls, handed on by public tender

  Around a hundred licensed street stalls, and the fish market that made them.

• 

  Food Fukushima ★★★

  Fukushima Peaches

  Several growers' peaches on one counter, mid-way along the orchard road.

• 

  Food Hokkaido ★★★

  Hakodate Shio Ramen — Hokkaido's clear salt-broth ramen

  Hokkaido's clear bowl, met in the quarter it came from.

• 

  Craft Kagoshima ★★★

  Oshima Tsumugi Silk — Kagoshima's mud-dyed island silk

  A municipal museum where the island that gives the silk its name explains itself, loom included.

• 

  Food Hyogo ★★★

  Ibonoito Somen — Banshu's hand-stretched wheat noodle

  A supermarket name, traced back to the valley that makes it.

• 

  Food Hokkaido ★★★

  Ikura Soy-Marinated Salmon Roe — Salmon town on the Nemuro Strait

  Pick the date by the tank, not by the town.

• 

  Food Hokkaido ★★★

  Ishikari-nabe — Hokkaido's salmon and miso hot pot

  The river mouth that named Hokkaido's salmon hot pot, walkable in one loop.

• 

  Food Hokkaido ★★★

  Jingisukan — Hokkaido's grilled lamb on a domed iron pan

  Hokkaido's lamb and the brewery that grew up beside it, on one walled block.

• 

  History Hokkaido ★★★

  Kakinoshima and Ofune Jomon Sites

  Two World Heritage Jomon settlements and a National Treasure figure, on one coast road.

• 

  History Ishikawa ★★★

  Kanazawa Castle Park

  A castle you can walk into before breakfast, for nothing.

• 

  Craft Ishikawa ★★★

  Kanazawa Gold Leaf — Japan's only museum for gold leaf, in Higashiyama

  The only museum in Japan for a craft one city has kept alive.

• 

  Food Hokkaido ★★★

  Kegani Horsehair Crab — Japan's top landing port on the Okhotsk coast

  Come in on the one daily coach and give the town a night.

• 

  Food Aichi ★★★

  Kishimen — Aichi's flat wheat noodle, eaten at the station

  Aichi's flat noodle, served exactly where travellers change trains.

• 

  Food Hyogo ★★★

  Kobe Beef

  A free prefectural museum on the cattle line that becomes Kobe beef.

• 

  Craft Hiroshima ★★★

  Kumano Brushes — Japan's brush town, east of Hiroshima

  The town that makes Japan's brushes, shown at its own museum.

• 

  Craft Ishikawa ★★★

  Kutani Ware — Ishikawa's overglaze porcelain at its kiln village

  A porcelain that died out for a century, and a room for every colour it uses.

• 

  Food Kyoto ★★★

  Kyoto Pickles — Senmaizuke, suguki and shibazuke at the source

  The purple in Kyoto's shibazuke is grown as a crop in this valley.

• 

  Craft Kyoto ★★★

  Kyo-yaki and Kiyomizu-yaki — Kyoto's own ceramics and the quarter that fires them

  Kyoto's best-known ceramics, met where they are fired.

• 

  Craft Gifu ★★★

  Mino Ware

  A whole pottery region, gathered into one building on a ridge.

• 

  Craft Gifu ★★★

  Mino Washi — Handmade paper from the Itadori valley

  The village that makes the paper, with its working floor open to you.

• 

  Food Aichi ★★★

  Miso Nikomi Udon — Clay-pot noodles in Nagoya's Osu arcades

  Bean-miso broth in a clay pot, found on a walk through Nagoya's loudest arcades.

• 

  Food Aichi ★★★

  Miso Katsu — Nagoya's pork cutlet under a dark bean-miso sauce

  Nagoya's best-known plate, sampled across one layered downtown block.

• 

  Food Miyazaki ★★★

  Miyazaki Charcoal-Grilled Jidori Chicken

  One floor where the bird, the standard behind it and the shochu all sit together.

• 

  Food Miyazaki ★★★

  Miyazaki Tree-Ripened Mango — A netted apple mango, met at a coastal roadside stop

  A produce shelf, a palm garden and a sea view stacked on one hillside.

• 

  Food Hiroshima ★★★

  Momiji Manju — Hiroshima's maple-leaf cake

  Hiroshima's maple-leaf cake, at the pier where every Miyajima trip starts.

• 

  Food Iwate ★★★

  Morioka Reimen — Morioka's cold noodle in a beef-bone broth

  A cold noodle invented in this city, served where the trains come in.

• 

  Food Fukuoka ★★★

  Motsunabe — Hakata's hot pot of beef offal and garlic chives

  Fukuoka's own hot pot, met at the station where the city starts.

• 

  Craft Kyoto ★★★

  Nishijin-ori — Kyoto's yarn-dyed figured silk

  Yarn dyed before it reaches the loom, and the looms worked in the open.

• 

  Food Aomori ★★★

  Oma Tuna

  The strait that makes the fish, seen from the rock the fish is named after.

• 

  Craft Hokkaido ★★★

  Otaru Glass — lamps and fishing floats turned craft

  The souvenir glass makes sense once you have seen the herring gear it came from.

• 

  Nature Fukushima ★★★

  Oze National Park

  Japan's great mountain wetland, entered by the Fukushima door.

• 

  Craft Kagoshima ★★★

  Satsuma Kiriko Cut Glass

  A free look at the cutting floor where Kagoshima's lost glass was brought back.

• 

  History Miyagi ★★★

  Sendai Castle Ruins

  A castle with no keep — the wall, the horseman, and the whole city below.

• 

  Culture Miyagi ★★★

  Sendai Tanabata Festival

  Tohoku's biggest summer festival, walked end to end without stepping outside.

• 

  Local life Kagawa ★★★

  Great Seto Bridge

  Stand under the last span of a road-and-rail bridge, with a free museum on how it was built.

• 

  Food Gunma ★★★

  Shimonita Negi — Gunma's short, thick winter leek

  Japan's fattest leek, met at the timber terminus of the town that grew it.

• 

  Craft Hyogo ★★★

  Tamba Ware

  A whole kiln village, and the kiln that fires it.

• 

  Food Aichi ★★★

  Tebasaki — Nagoya's twice-fried chicken wings

  Nagoya's night-time snack, traced back to the morning market that supplies it.

• 

  Food Hokkaido ★★★

  Tokachi Butadon — Obihiro's grilled pork rice bowl

  Tokachi's own bowl, a five-minute walk from the platform.

• 

  Craft Kochi ★★★

  Tosa Washi — Kochi's papermaking town on the Niyodo

  A town museum where the paper called a mayfly's wing is explained, demonstrated and handed to you.

• 

  Craft Ishikawa ★★★

  Wajima Lacquerware

  The whole craft under one roof, in the town that makes it.

• 

  Food Iwate ★★★

  Wanko Soba — Iwate's soba served one small bowl at a time

  Iwate's bowl-by-bowl soba, met in the old castle town rather than at the station.

• 

  Craft Kyoto ★★★

  Kyo-Yuzen — Kyoto's painted kimono dyeing

  The dyeing behind Kyoto's kimono, shown among every craft the city still keeps.

• 

  Food Miyagi ★★★

  Zunda Mochi — Miyagi's mochi under sweet edamame paste

  Miyagi's food for occasions, on a plate a minute from the Shinkansen gates.

• 

  Food Okinawa ★★★

  Awamori of Shuri Sanka — Where Okinawa's rice spirit was born

  The quarter that once held every awamori licence in the kingdom.

• 

  Food Niigata ★★★

  Hegisoba — Funori-bound soba from Niigata's snow country

  The noodle, the dried packs and the looms that inspired it, all under one roof.

• 

  Craft Saga ★★★

  Karatsu Ware — Saga's tea-ceremony stoneware, shown by its kiln guild

  One room by the station where the work of every guild kiln stands side by side.

• 

  Food Osaka ★★★

  Osaka Kushikatsu — Deep-fried skewers and the one-dip rule

  Osaka's signature skewers, at counters under the tracks by the station.

• 

  History Nagasaki ★★★

  Nagasaki Atomic Bomb Museum

  Nagasaki's own record of the bombing, underground, with a free memorial hall next door.

• 

  Food Oita ★★★

  Nakatsu Karaage — Oita's fried-chicken town, ordered by weight

  Fried to order and sold by weight, in a town that treats it as everyday food.

• 

  Food Niigata ★★★

  Niigata Sake — The prefecture's brewers under one station roof

  Every brewery in Japan's densest sake prefecture, along one wall of taps.

• 

  Food Okayama ★★★

  Kibi Dango — Okayama's Momotaro sweet, at the prefectural shop

  Okayama's Momotaro sweet, its whole range on one prefectural shelf.

• 

  Food Okayama ★★★

  Okayama Muscat — Kurashiki's glasshouse grape country

  Japan's famous muscat, graded and sold in the village that grows it.

• 

  Food Okinawa ★★★

  Okinawa Chinsuko — Ryukyu court shortbread of flour, sugar and lard

  The first roadside station in Okinawa, and the island sweet that now carries a protected name.

• 

  Food Okinawa ★★★

  Goya — Okinawa's bitter melon, cropped all year

  Okinawa's year-round bitter melon, in the farm shop nearest the airport.

• 

  Food Okinawa ★★★

  Okinawa Kokuto — Unrefined cane sugar from eight outer islands

  Eight islands' worth of unrefined cane sugar, gathered under one roof.

• 

  Food Okinawa ★★★

  Umibudo — Okinawa's sea grapes, farmed in tanks on shore

  Okinawa's sea grapes, on the counter in the village where tank farming started.

• 

  Food Okinawa ★★★

  Orion Happy Park — Nago brewery of Okinawa's own beer

  Okinawa's own beer, seen from a walkway above the line that fills it.

• 

  Craft Okinawa ★★★

  Ryukyu Bingata Stencil Dyeing — Okinawa's court dyeing, kept at the prefectural museum

  The kingdom's dyed cloth, kept where anyone can walk in and look.

• 

  Craft Okinawa ★★★

  Ryukyu Glass Village — Okinawa's largest hand-blown glass works

  The furnace floor the souvenir glass actually comes from.

• 

  Food Saga ★★★

  Saga Beef — A top-grade wagyu, sold at the co-op's own counter

  A national beef brand sold over the counter of the body that defines it.

• 

  Craft Niigata ★★★

  Tsubame-Sanjo Jibasan Center — The showroom of Japan's cutlery and blade country

  A whole metalworking region's output, on one floor beside a shinkansen station.

• 

  History Saga ★★★

  Yutoku Inari Shrine

  Lacquer and colour on a hillside stage, with a torii path climbing on behind.

• 

  History Nagasaki ★★★

  Dejima — Nagasaki's fan-shaped Dutch trading island

  Japan's one window on the West, walked end to end before the city wakes.

• 

  History Niigata ★★★

  Sado Island Gold Mines

  A World Heritage gold mine you walk into, at the last stop of the island bus.

• 

  Craft Tokushima ★★★

  Ai no Yakata Indigo Museum

  Japan Blue at its source, in the house of the merchant who sold it.

• 

  Craft Yamaguchi ★★★

  Hagi Ware — Tea ceramics that change colour the more you use them

  Work from many Hagi kilns in one room, a short walk from the station.

• 

  Food Nara ★★★

  Kakinoha-zushi — Nara's salted mackerel pressed inside a persimmon leaf

  Persimmon-leaf sushi in the river town where the salted fish came inland.

• 

  History Tochigi ★★★

  Nikkozan Rinnoji and Taiyuin — Iemitsu's mausoleum beside Toshogu

  Nikko's main hall and Iemitsu's black-and-gold mausoleum, on one ticket, at opposite ends of the precinct.

• 

  Nature Tokyo ★★★

  Ogasawara Islands — Tokyo's subtropical World Natural Heritage chain

  Tokyo's World Heritage islands — no airport, one ship, a full day at sea.

• 

  History Tokushima ★★★

  Ryozenji Temple — Temple 1 of the Shikoku pilgrimage

  Where the Shikoku pilgrimage starts, reachable as a half-day trip from Tokushima.

• 

  Food Tochigi ★★★

  Sano Ramen — Tochigi's bamboo-pole noodle town

  Bamboo-beaten noodles in a clear soy broth, in a town where you walk between the shops.

• 

  Food Yamanashi ★★★

  Kikyo Shingen Mochi — Yamanashi's best-known sweet, made at a factory you can tour

  Yamanashi's signature sweet, tied by hand on a line you can watch for free.

• 

  Food Shimane ★★★

  Lake Shinji Shijimi Clams

  Japan's leading shijimi, bought on the shore it came from.

• 

  Food Nagano ★★★

  Shinshu Miso — Nagano's pale, sharp rice ferment

  A working miso plant with an open visitor hall, reached on foot from an express station.

• 

  Food Shizuoka ★★★

  Shizuoka Oden

  Black broth, one skewer at a time, in the lanes the food carts moved into.

• 

  Food Shizuoka ★★★

  Shizuoka Wasabi — the wasabi terraces beside Joren Falls

  Wasabi you can actually look at — the fall, the stone beds, the climb back.

• 

  Food Toyama ★★★

  Toyama Bay Firefly Squid — Namerikawa's museum, and a boat before dawn

  A protected sea, a glow show and a pre-dawn boat, all in one stop.

• 

  Food Wakayama ★★★

  Yuasa Soy Sauce Town — A preserved brewing district in Wakayama

  The town where Japanese soy sauce began, still brewing and still walkable.

• 

  Culture Tochigi ★★★

  Futarasan Chugushi Shrine — Nikko's lakeside shrine below Mt Nantai

  A shrine whose deity is a mountain, and the gate to it opens for half the year.

• 

  Culture Akita ★★★

  Akita Inu no Sato — Odate's Akita dog hall by the station

  Hachiko's birthplace, with a live Akita on view and free entry.

• 

  Food Shizuoka ★★★

  Hamamatsu Eel

  Lake Hamana eel from the farmers' own counter, steps from the ticket gates.

• 

  Culture Ishikawa ★★★

  Kanazawa Station Tsuzumi-mon — A Noh-drum gate and glass dome at the east exit

  A Noh-drum gate and a glass umbrella — turn around on the plaza to see both.

• 

  Culture Saga ★★★

  Karatsu Kunchi — Karatsu Shrine's autumn festival of lacquered floats

  Lacquered floats in a castle town, and a noon haul across the sand.

• 

  Nature Shizuoka ★★★

  Kawazu-zakura — The early cherry avenue along the Kawazu River

  Late-winter cherries along a river, walked from the station to the tree they began with.

• 

  Food Nagasaki ★★★

  Nagasaki Castella — A sponge cake with Portuguese roots

  Nagasaki's signature sponge cake, compared maker by maker right at the station gates.

• 

  Culture Nagasaki ★★★

  Nagasaki Kunchi — Suwa Shrine's autumn festival of dragon dances

  Nagasaki's great October festival, with free lottery seats and free street shows.

• 

  Entertainment Saga ★★★

  Saga International Balloon Fiesta

  Asia's biggest balloon meet — come for the calmer morning flights.

• 

  Culture Gifu ★★★

  Takayama Festival Floats Exhibition Hall

  Real Takayama festival floats, up close on any day of the year.

• 

  Culture Ibaraki ★★★

  Tsukuba Space Center — JAXA's campus and its free space exhibition hall

  A full-scale Kibo lab and real rocket engines — free, with no booking needed.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★

  Jakkō-in — Ōhara's quiet west-side nunnery

  A thousand-year nunnery on Ōhara's quiet west side, off the main Kyoto route.

• 

  Onsen Kyoto ★★

  Kurama Onsen

  A real forest onsen 30 min from Kyoto, reachable by one scenic train — outdoor bath open to the mountains.

• 

  Craft Kyoto ★★

  Miyama Kayabuki-no-Sato — Kyoto's living thatched-roof village

  One of Japan's densest clusters of lived-in thatched houses, still a working craft.

• 

  Local life Chiba ★★

  Sawara — the Edo canal town

  A real Edo canal town with old shops still trading — an easy train day trip from Tokyo.

• 

  Local life Kyoto ★★

  Ine no Funaya — the boathouse village built on the sea

  A rare village where fishing homes sit right on the water — quiet, lived-in, walkable.

• 

  History Hyogo ★★

  Arima Onsen's upper temple quarter

  An 8-min climb above Arima's onsen crowds to its 3 oldest temples and its spring shrine.

• 

  History Wakayama ★★

  Nyonin-michi — Koyasan's women's pilgrimage route

  A quiet forest trail around the temple town, walked by women once barred from Koyasan.

• 

  History Tokyo ★★

  Nezu Shrine's Otome Inari torii tunnel

  A small red-torii tunnel in central Tokyo, quiet if you come early, plus an azalea slope in spring.

• 

  Local life Saitama ★★

  Kawagoe's Taisho Roman Dream Street — one block off the warehouse row

  The same old-Kawagoe townscape, one block quieter — right on the way to the warehouse row.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★

  Nijo Castle

  A UNESCO World Heritage shogun palace; arrive at 8:45 opening to hear the chirping floors before crowds.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★

  Ginkaku-ji — the Silver Pavilion and the Philosopher's Path

  A UNESCO World Heritage temple plus a two-kilometre cherry-lined canal walk, calmest right at opening.

• 

  History Osaka ★★

  Sumiyoshi Taisha's Drum Bridge

  Osaka's oldest major shrine and its famous drum bridge — free, minutes from the station.

• 

  History Nara ★★

  Kasuga Taisha — the shrine of three thousand lanterns

  A UNESCO shrine; a forest path of ~2,000 stone lanterns, free to walk and quiet early on.

• 

  Local life Hyogo ★★

  Kitano Ijinkan — Western merchant houses on the hill

  A hill of preserved 1868-era Western merchant houses, best at opening before the crowds.

• 

  Food Hyogo ★★

  Nankinmachi — Kobe's Chinatown

  A famous Chinatown you can walk end to end in minutes — quietest at its 10:00 opening.

• 

  Nature Tokyo ★★

  Shinjuku Gyoen — three garden styles in one walled park

  A world-famous garden that stays genuinely quiet if you arrive at the 9 a.m. weekday opening.

• 

  Culture Tokyo ★★

  Tokyo National Museum

  Japan's deepest art collection, open to 8 p.m. on Fri and Sat when it is far quieter.

• 

  History Tokyo ★★

  Imperial Palace East Gardens

  Free, huge, and central — the real Edo Castle grounds, minus the crowds at the outer plaza.

• 

  History Kanagawa ★★

  Tsurugaoka Hachimangu — Kamakura's founding shrine

  Kamakura's founding shrine, reached up the quiet 500-metre Dankazura cherry avenue.

• 

  Food Kanagawa ★★

  Yokohama Chinatown

  Japan's largest Chinatown: Cantonese dim sum and a historic temple in one walkable grid.

• 

  Food Tokyo ★★

  Tsukishima Monja Street — Tokyo's own tabletop food, cooked by you

  Tokyo's own tabletop street food, cooked by you, on one dense shitamachi lane.

• 

  Onsen Hyogo ★★

  Kinosaki Onsen

  A hot-spring town you tour on foot in a yukata, hopping six open public bathhouses.

• 

  Local life Tokyo ★★

  Takeshita Street — the 400-metre home of kawaii culture

  The 400-metre lane that launched kawaii fashion — one minute from Harajuku Station.

• 

  Local life Tokyo ★★

  Akihabara — Tokyo's otaku capital

  Post-war radio parts grew into Tokyo's otaku capital — best explored on a Sunday afternoon car-free promenade.

• 

  Local life Tokyo ★★

  SHIBUYA SKY — an open rooftop 229 metres up

  The city's best straight-down view of the Scramble Crossing — book a timed ticket online before you go.

• 

  Entertainment Tokyo ★★

  teamLab Borderless — a digital art museum with no map

  Tokyo's landmark immersive digital art museum — no map, no fixed rooms, artworks that flow between spaces. Book weeks ahead.

• 

  Local life Tokyo ★★

  Shinjuku Golden Gai — six alleys of tiny post-war bars

  Post-war Tokyo's most atmospheric bar enclave — six alleys, around 200 tiny bars, each with its own world inside.

• 

  Entertainment Osaka ★★

  Tsutenkaku — Osaka's retro tower

  Osaka's retro landmark in a genuine shitamachi (old downtown) neighbourhood — the Billiken and kushikatsu culture are found nowhere else.

• 

  Local life Osaka ★★

  Harukas 300 — Osaka's sky observation deck

  Japan's second-tallest building and Osaka's premier sky observation deck — glass floor, 360-degree city-to-bay panorama, open until 22:00.

• 

  History Kanagawa ★★

  Yokohama Red Brick Warehouse

  Yokohama's 1911 customs warehouses — restored brick halls on the pier, with the bay on one side and the city skyline on the other.

• 

  History Kanagawa ★★

  Sankeien Garden

  Ten Important Cultural Properties in one garden — a 15th-century Kyoto pagoda, a Shirakawago farmhouse, and more, all within Yokohama.

• 

  Local life Kanagawa ★★

  Kamakurakokomae Railway Crossing

  The Slam Dunk crossing on the Enoden — a coastal train, a bay view, and a famous frame that still draws visitors from across Asia.

• 

  Nature Hyogo ★★

  Naruto Strait whirlpools

  The closest sea-level view of the Naruto whirlpools — check the tide calendar and choose a spring-tide departure for the largest swirls.

• 

  Nature Mie ★★

  Nabana no Sato — Japan's largest illumination and a flower park

  Japan's largest-scale winter illumination, set in a flower park that changes with every season.

• 

  Craft Osaka ★★

  Doguyasuji — a street of nothing but kitchen tools

  150 metres and sixty shops selling only the tools of cooking, 3 min from Namba.

• 

  Craft Osaka ★★

  Sakai's forged blades — the knife town's free museum and shop

  Free museum and shop run by the trade that forges Japan's professional kitchen knives.

• 

  Local life Tokyo ★★

  Togoshi Ginza — Tokyo's longest shopping street

  1.3 km and 400 shops of everyday Tokyo — the first street ever to borrow Ginza's name.

• 

  Onsen Kanagawa ★★

  Yugawara Onsen

  The soft old spring Tokyo trains run straight past on the way to Hakone — 90 min out, and quiet.

• 

  History Nara ★★

  Kashihara Jingu — the shrine to Japan's first emperor

  The shrine to Japan's legendary first emperor — free, vast, and quiet at sunrise, with Mt. Unebi behind the halls.

• 

  History Nara ★★

  Ishibutai Kofun — a megalithic tomb you can step inside

  A 7th-century megalithic tomb you can walk inside — 2,300 tons of granite standing bare in an Asuka field.

• 

  History Tokyo ★★

  Kokyo Gaien and Nijubashi — the free plaza before the Imperial Palace

  The classic Imperial Palace and Nijubashi view — free, always open, and genuinely quiet before nine in the morning.

• 

  Nature Tokyo ★★

  Yoyogi Park

  A huge free park beside Harajuku — picnic lawns on weekdays, a citywide open-air scene every Sunday.

• 

  Culture Tokyo ★★

  The National Museum of Modern Art

  Japan's first national art museum — the full modern century in twelve rooms, ten minutes from Tokyo Station.

• 

  Nature Tokyo ★★

  Sumida Aquarium

  An indoor aquarium in Skytree Town — open penguin pool, jellyfish and Edo goldfish, with a combo ticket for the tower.

• 

  Culture Kyoto ★★

  Kyoto International Manga Museum

  Japan's landmark manga museum in a converted Kyoto schoolhouse — 300,000 items, and shelves you can read from on the lawn.

• 

  Local life Osaka ★★

  Amerikamura and Triangle Park — Osaka's street-culture district

  Osaka's street-culture district — vintage shops, record stores and Triangle Park, five minutes' walk from Dotonbori.

• 

  Onsen Nara ★★

  Dorogawa Onsen

  A pilgrim's onsen street that still looks the part after dark. Two and a half hours from Osaka, but the bus decides your day — plan around it.

• 

  Onsen Wakayama ★★

  Bokido — a bath inside a sea cave

  Bathing inside a sea cave, with the Pacific at the far end. Four hours from Osaka and a boat at the end of it — plan the return train first.

• 

  Onsen Wakayama ★★

  Ryujin Onsen

  One of Japan's three waters for the skin, in a valley with no railway. Stay the night — the four-bus timetable decides everything else.

• 

  Onsen Hyogo ★★

  Yumura Onsen

  A boiling source pool in the middle of the street, and a free foot bath along the river. Four hours from Osaka; the express bus back is often easier than the train.

• 

  Onsen Shiga ★★

  Ogoto Onsen

  A lakeside onsen twenty-five minutes from Kyoto Station on an ordinary train. Take a day-use bath facing Lake Biwa and be back for dinner.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★

  Higashi Hongan-ji — one of the world's largest wooden halls

  One of the world's largest wooden halls, free, open before six, ten minutes from Kyoto Station. Sit down inside — the scale only registers from the floor.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★

  Rurikoin — the temple with the garden-reflecting table

  The reflection is real and it is worth the trip, but the temple is shut most of the year. Check the dates first, and consider the green season over the maples.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★

  Daikakuji — an emperor's villa turned temple

  An emperor's villa turned temple, with the oldest garden pond in Japan behind it. Six minutes by bus past Arashiyama, and a fraction of the crowd.

• 

  History Nara ★★

  Murō-ji — the mountain temple that welcomed women

  The mountain temple that admitted women when Mount Kōya would not — a cedar staircase, five National Treasures, and the smallest ancient pagoda in Japan.

• 

  History Nara ★★

  Tanzan Shrine

  The only wooden thirteen-storey pagoda left on earth, standing in a valley of three thousand maples where the Taika Reform was plotted in 645.

• 

  History Nara ★★

  Imai-chō — an Edo merchant town still lived in

  An entire Edo merchant town still standing and still lived in — five hundred traditional houses on the original grid, free to walk, ten minutes from the station.

• 

  History Hyogo ★★

  Engyō-ji on Mount Shosha — the cliffside temple above Himeji

  A stage-built hall on a rock face and three vast wooden halls in a cedar clearing, 371 m above Himeji and forty-five minutes from the castle.

• 

  History Hyogo ★★

  Ikuta Shrine

  The shrine Kobe is named after, eight minutes from Sannomiya — with a Genpei War battlefield grove behind the hall and a fortune you read off water.

• 

  Food Hyogo ★★

  Izushi castle town

  A preserved castle town where the clock tower has run since 1881 and forty soba shops serve buckwheat five small plates at a time.

• 

  Nature Hyogo ★★

  Genbudō — a cliff of hexagonal basalt columns

  A cliff of hexagonal basalt columns that gave the Japanese language its word for basalt and gave earth science its first proof that the poles reverse.

• 

  History Shiga ★★

  Ishiyamadera — where The Tale of Genji was begun

  A National Treasure hall, a 12th-century pagoda, and the room where the world's first novel was begun — half an hour from Kyoto.

• 

  Nature Shiga ★★

  The Makino metasequoia avenue

  2.4 kilometres of dawn redwoods on the northwest shore of Lake Biwa — a completely different landscape in each season.

• 

  Onsen Wakayama ★★

  Tsuboyu at Yunomine — the only World Heritage bath you can enter

  The only World Heritage site you can bathe in — a two-person rock pool still used as a pilgrim's purification bath.

• 

  Nature Mie ★★

  Toba Aquarium

  The only dugong in Japan and the widest species range of any Japanese aquarium — ten minutes' walk from Toba Station.

• 

  Nature Mie ★★

  Yokoyama Observatory

  The defining view of Ise-Shima — Ago Bay's islands and pearl rafts from 140 metres up, free of charge.

• 

  Local life Tokyo ★★

  Yanaka Ginza — 170 metres of old downtown Tokyo

  170 metres of postwar downtown Tokyo, five minutes off the Yamanote Line — and one of the city's few genuine eat-as-you-walk streets.

• 

  History Tokyo ★★

  Kanda Myojin — Edo's guardian shrine above Akihabara

  Thirteen centuries of Edo's guardian shrine, five minutes uphill from Akihabara — and it sells charms for your servers.

• 

  Local life Tokyo ★★

  Nakano Broadway — a 1960s mall turned collectors' labyrinth

  Akihabara's secondhand counterpart — dozens of specialist collectors' shops packed into an unrenovated 1966 building, five minutes from Shinjuku.

• 

  History Tokyo ★★

  Tsukiji Hongwanji — a temple built in ancient Indian style

  A stone temple in ancient Indian style, free and open from early morning, one minute from Tsukiji Outer Market.

• 

  Nature Tokyo ★★

  Sunshine Aquarium

  A rooftop aquarium in Ikebukuro where sea lions circle overhead and penguins seem to fly past the office towers.

• 

  Culture Tokyo ★★

  Edo-Tokyo Open Air Architectural Museum

  Thirty real buildings from four centuries of Tokyo, moved to a park and opened up so you can walk inside them.

• 

  Nature Kanagawa ★★

  Enoshima Aquarium

  A beachfront aquarium about the bay it faces — sardine shoals, a domed jellyfish hall, and dolphins with the real sea behind them.

• 

  History Kanagawa ★★

  Sarushima — an uninhabited island fortress in Tokyo Bay

  Tokyo Bay's only uninhabited island — a brick fortress with tunnels and magazines, ten minutes by boat from Yokosuka.

• 

  Nature Chiba ★★

  Mother Farm

  A working hillside farm above Tokyo Bay — sheepdog displays, milking, flower fields and a Ferris wheel, two hours from Tokyo.

• 

  History Chiba ★★

  Inubosaki Lighthouse

  An 1874 brick lighthouse at Kanto's eastern tip — ninety-nine steps to the gallery, and the mainland's first sunrise of the year.

• 

  Nature Tochigi ★★

  Senjogahara — a marsh crossed on a wooden boardwalk

  A Ramsar-registered marsh at 1,400 metres that you can cross flat, in trainers, on a wooden boardwalk.

• 

  Nature Gunma ★★

  Fukiware Falls

  A national natural monument where the river cracks its own bed open — you look down into the falls from the side.

• 

  Nature Gunma ★★

  Mt. Tanigawa

  A 1,977-metre famous peak with a fifteen-minute gondola to 1,319 metres — alpine ground, no ascent required.

• 

  Nature Tokyo ★★

  Showa Kinen Park

  A former US air base turned into 160-plus hectares of garden and cycling ground, 45 minutes from Shinjuku.

• 

  History Tokyo ★★

  Tokyo Camii — Japan's largest mosque

  A full Ottoman mosque interior in a Shibuya side street — free, open to all faiths, with a guided tour at 14:30 on weekends.

• 

  History Tokyo ★★

  Ikegami Honmonji — the temple with Kanto's oldest pagoda

  Kanto's oldest five-storey pagoda, on the ground where Nichiren died — thirty-five minutes from Shinagawa, and free.

• 

  History Tochigi ★★

  Ashikaga Gakko — Japan's oldest school

  Japan's oldest school, reported to Europe by Francis Xavier in 1549 — 480 yen, and about an hour to see properly.

• 

  Nature Tochigi ★★

  Ryuokyo Ravine

  A national-park gorge with its own station, where 22-million-year-old rock changes colour along three named stretches.

• 

  Local life Saitama ★★

  Metropolitan Area Outer Underground Discharge Channel — a working flood cathedral beneath Kasukabe

  Book ahead, bring a layer: a 177-metre concrete hall fifty metres underground, and it is still in active service.

• 

  Culture Saitama ★★

  Kadokawa Musashino Museum

  Fifty minutes from Shinjuku: a Kengo Kuma stone block, and inside it a hall walled in eight metres of books.

• 

  Onsen Yamanashi ★★

  Hottarakashi Onsen — an open-air bath that opens before sunrise

  Book the taxi the night before, get in the water in the dark, and watch Fuji come up over the Kofu basin.

• 

  Nature Yamanashi ★★

  Narusawa Ice Cave & Fugaku Wind Cave

  Three degrees inside all year: walk the lava-field path between the two caves rather than riding it.

• 

  History Ibaraki ★★

  Kamiiso-no-Torii — a gate standing where the waves break

  Stay in Oarai or Mito the night before: the gate on the reef only does its trick at sunrise.

• 

  Nature Ibaraki ★★

  Mount Tsukuba

  Cable car up, ridge on foot, ropeway down — and in winter, Fuji on the far edge of the plain.

• 

  Entertainment Tochigi ★★

  Tobu World Square — famous buildings rebuilt at one twenty-fifth scale

  Two hours, entirely outdoors, one minute from its own station — and a 25-metre Skytree at one twenty-fifth scale.

• 

  Entertainment Tochigi ★★

  Edo Wonderland Nikko Edomura

  Put the costume on first: the staff stay in character, so dressed as a resident you are in the town rather than watching it.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★

  Eikando Zenrin-ji — the temple of the Amida who looks back

  Kyoto's great maple temple, whose main image is a Buddha carved in the act of looking back over its shoulder.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★

  Shisendo — a poet's retreat

  A poet's 1641 hillside villa where the garden's main event is a sound — the bamboo clapper said to have been invented here.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★

  Manshuin Monzeki — the little Katsura, a sukiya temple

  A prince-abbot's sukiya temple built by the son of Katsura's founder — the same architecture, with no booking required.

• 

  Local life Osaka ★★

  Kishiwada Castle & the Danjiri Hall

  Real danjiri carts and a renewed festival film year-round, beside a 1954 keep with a Shigemori Mirei rock garden at its foot.

• 

  History Nara ★★

  Takamatsuzuka Tomb

  An empty 7th-century tomb whose National Treasure murals were removed in 2007 — shown next door as reproductions, and in the original only by ballot.

• 

  Food Shiga ★★

  La Collina Omihachiman — a grass-roofed sweets village in the fields

  A Fujimori Terunobu landscape you can walk into free — grass roof, working paddy, and baumkuchen baked on site.

• 

  History Yamanashi ★★

  Kuon-ji on Mount Minobu — a head temple up 287 steps

  The Nichiren head temple on a Yamanashi mountain: 287 steps, a 400-year-old weeping cherry, and a dawn service worth staying overnight for.

• 

  Entertainment Yamanashi ★★

  Kiyosato Highlands & Moegi Village — a forest carousel at 1,200 m

  A Yatsugatake highland village at 1,200 m — music box museum, forest carousel and an on-site brewery, free to walk into.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★

  Jojakko-ji — a hillside temple of maples

  A steep, small, layered temple ten minutes beyond the bamboo grove — two hundred maples, a 1620 pagoda, and a view west over Sagano.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★

  Kurama-dera — a mountain temple with its own school

  A whole mountainside run by its own school of Buddhism — a star-mandala pavement, a switchback cedar path, and a ridge walk down into Kibune.

• 

  Nature Kyoto ★★

  Kyoto Aquarium

  An aquarium with no sea within an hour of it — giant salamanders, a sardine tank standing in for the Sea of Japan, and the railway museum next door.

• 

  Culture Kyoto ★★

  Kyoto National Museum

  The city's religious and courtly art in one calm modern hall, directly across the road from Sanjusangendo.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★

  Keage Incline — the slope where boats were carried uphill

  An 1891 boat railway left exactly where it stopped — free, ungated, and best walked at dawn under the cherry trees.

• 

  Culture Osaka ★★

  Osaka Museum of Housing and Living

  A 19th-century Osaka street rebuilt at full size indoors, with a fifteen-minute sunrise-to-night cycle overhead — and the real arcade waiting downstairs.

• 

  History Osaka ★★

  Katsuo-ji — a mountain temple colonised by tiny daruma

  Thousands of small red dolls, each one a completed promise, spread across a 1,300-year-old pilgrimage temple in the hills above Osaka.

• 

  History Osaka ★★

  Osaka Central Public Hall

  A 1918 red-brick hall on an island between two rivers, paid for by a man who died before it opened — free to look at, floodlit at night.

• 

  Food Ibaraki ★★

  Ankou Nabe — Ibaraki's winter monkfish hot pot

  Ibaraki's winter pot, met first as a whole fish on the market ice.

• 

  Craft Okayama ★★

  Bizen Ware — Unglazed stoneware from one of Japan's six old kilns

  A pottery town where the station, the sales hall and a 400-year-old kiln site are all one short walk.

• 

  Food Ehime ★★

  Ehime Mikan — Japan's citrus country, sampled in central Matsuyama

  A whole prefecture's citrus lineup, juice tap included, in one room on the castle route.

• 

  Food Aichi ★★

  Hatcho Miso — Okazaki's dark soybean miso and the brewery behind it

  Free tours through working miso vats, five minutes from the station.

• 

  Food Toyama ★★

  Himi Winter Yellowtail — Toyama Bay's cold-season fish at the port market

  The port's public side, with the fish hall in the morning and a free foot bath at the end.

• 

  Craft Ehime ★★

  Imabari Towels — Japan's biggest towel region at its brand showroom

  The mills' own showroom, where you can water-test a towel before buying it.

• 

  Food Okinawa ★★

  Ishigaki Beef

  Japan's southernmost wagyu brand, met over a counter instead of a menu.

• 

  Food Shimane ★★

  Izumo Soba

  Both ways of eating one noodle, on the shrine's own approach.

• 

  Food Ishikawa ★★

  Kano Snow Crab and Kobako Crab — Ishikawa's tagged winter snow crab

  Winter snow crab bought at the port that landed it, blue tag and all.

• 

  Food Kumamoto ★★

  Karashi Renkon — Lotus root packed with mustard miso and fried

  Kumamoto's mustard-stuffed lotus root, with the makers side by side.

• 

  Food Yamaguchi ★★

  Kawara Soba — Yamaguchi's tea soba seared on a roof tile

  The village that invented kawara soba, with a public bath at the end of the street.

• 

  Food Wakayama ★★

  Kishu Nanko Plums

  The plum behind Japanese umeboshi, explained free in the town that bred it.

• 

  Food Yamanashi ★★

  Koshu Wine — Where Japan's first winery was founded

  Taste across a whole wine district from one municipal cellar, not one winery.

• 

  Food Tottori ★★

  Matsuba Snow Crab — Tottori's winter crab, bought at the port

  The port's public counter, with a place to sit down and eat what you bought.

• 

  Food Gunma ★★

  Mizusawa Udon — A noodle street at the Mizusawa Kannon gate

  Udon houses in a line at a temple gate, with the grounds to walk first.

• 

  Food Niigata ★★

  Nanban-ebi Sweet Shrimp

  Niigata's own sweet shrimp at a harbour market, a quarter of an hour on foot from the shinkansen.

• 

  Food Tokushima ★★

  Naruto Kintoki Sweet Potato

  Tokushima's sand-grown sweet potato, sold and cooked at the same address.

• 

  Food Chiba ★★

  Noda Soy Sauce — The brewing town where Kikkoman began

  A free hour inside a working soy sauce plant, three minutes from the platform.

• 

  Food Ishikawa ★★

  Noto Oysters — Nanao Bay's winter oyster coast

  Winter oysters bought on the road that grows them, with a roadside station as the front door.

• 

  Food Okayama ★★

  Okayama White Peach

  Japan's most famous white peach, bought at the co-op counter beside the orchards that grew it.

• 

  Food Miyagi ★★

  Sasa Kamaboko — Miyagi's leaf-shaped grilled fish cake

  Miyagi's fish cake, bought in the lane where the city's cooks shop.

• 

  Food Oita ★★

  Seki Aji and Seki Saba — Oita's line-caught brand mackerel

  The strait's brand fish, bought and eaten on the coast where the boats land them.

• 

  Food Nagasaki ★★

  Shimabara Hand-Stretched Somen — Thin wheat noodles pulled by hand, not cut

  The heartland of hand-pulled somen, with a buried village preserved next door.

• 

  Food Kagawa ★★

  Shodoshima Olives

  Olive growing in Japan began on this hill, and the front door to it is a roadside station.

• 

  Food Nagano ★★

  Togakushi Soba — Buckwheat from a mountain pilgrimage road

  Roll it, read about it, then eat it — the one place on the mountain that does all three.

• 

  Craft Aichi ★★

  Tokoname Pottery

  A working kiln town walked in an hour, two stops from the airport.

• 

  Food Oita ★★

  Toriten — Oita's chicken tempura, dipped in mustard vinegar

  Oita's signature chicken tempura, sold by the piece in the station's own market.

• 

  Food Tottori ★★

  Tottori Nijisseiki Pear — The green pear Tottori built a museum for

  A museum for one fruit, with a full-grown pear tree indoors and three varieties to taste.

• 

  Food Toyama ★★

  Toyama Bay White Shrimp

  Toyama's signature shrimp, sold and served beside the port that lands it.

• 

  Food Saga ★★

  Yobuko Squid

  Saga's famous squid at a direct-sales counter, with a castle ruin next door.

• 

  Food Yamagata ★★

  Yonezawa Beef — Yamagata's wagyu brand from the Okitama basin

  Yamagata's wagyu brand, eaten and bought at one public stop, no booking.

• 

  Nature Toyama ★★

  Amaharashi Coast

  Toyama's best-known view, plus a rule for when to stand there.

• 

  Craft Aichi ★★

  Arimatsu Shibori Townscape — Nagoya's tie-dye quarter on the old Tokaido

  One street, one craft — a national preservation district inside Nagoya.

• 

  Craft Toyama ★★

  Inami Woodcarving Town

  A craft town where the workshops are the street rather than an exhibit.

• 

  Nature Fukui ★★

  Mikata Five Lakes

  Five lakes of different salt, all in view from one deck above Wakasa Bay.

• 

  History Niigata ★★

  Shukunegi — A shipwrights' village packed into a Sado inlet

  A whole village built by ship carpenters, still standing in its inlet.

• 

  Onsen Ishikawa ★★

  Wakura Onsen

  A salt hot spring fed from under the sea, with free baths you can use in an hour.

• 

  History Niigata ★★

  Yahiko Shrine — Echigo's first shrine under a sacred mountain

  Echigo's first shrine, with the summit tomb reachable in the same visit.

• 

  Nature Kumamoto ★★

  Amakusa Dolphin Center — Roadside station and dolphin-boat desk on the north shore

  A resident pod of wild dolphins, reached by public bus from Hondo.

• 

  Craft Saga ★★

  Arita Porcelain Town — Where Japanese porcelain began, in Saga

  The road where Japanese porcelain started, with kiln-brick walls and a porcelain torii.

• 

  History Kumamoto ★★

  Buzen Kaido in Yamaga — Edo post-road town with a working wooden playhouse

  An Edo highway still doing its old job as a town's main street.

• 

  Food Saga ★★

  Hizen Hamashuku Sakagura-dori — Kashima's preserved sake-brewing street

  A working sake street and a thatched fishing quarter, designated together, one bridge apart.

• 

  History Kagoshima ★★

  Izumi Fumoto Samurai District

  A listed samurai quarter free to walk, with one pass covering three houses.

• 

  History Miyazaki ★★

  Obi Castle Town

  Kyushu's first preservation district, with stone walls, cedar gates and one combined ticket.

• 

  Craft Saga ★★

  Okawachiyama — Imari's walled valley of Nabeshima porcelain kilns

  A dead-end valley of working kilns, sealed once by a domain barrier and still at the same work.

• 

  Local life Saga ★★

  Shiotatsu — Ureshino's river-port town on the old Nagasaki Road

  A Nagasaki Road merchant street with a tidal river port stacked up behind it.

• 

  Onsen Kumamoto ★★

  Tsuetate Onsen — Steam-cooking spa town on the Kumamoto-Oita border

  A gorge spa town where the source runs near boiling and the streets steam.

• 

  Onsen Saga ★★

  Ureshino Onsen — Saga's skin-softening hot spring town

  A bicarbonate spring you can bathe in for the day, and tofu cooked in the same water.

• 

  Food Saga ★★

  Yobuko Morning Market

  A daily port market on one street, sold by the people who set it up at dawn.

• 

  History Chiba ★★

  Nokogiriyama Nihon-ji — The cliff temple above Tokyo Bay in Chiba

  A quarried mountain that is all temple, with the Hell Peek slab at the top.

• 

  History Chiba ★★

  Otaki Castle Town

  A castle town small enough to walk end to end, with a national treasure of a merchant house on the street.

• 

  Local life Ehime ★★

  Shimonada Station

  A platform, a horizon, and a wait that is the point rather than the cost.

• 

  History Ehime ★★

  Uwajima Castle

  A surviving samurai-era keep on a stone-walled hill, climbed straight from the station.

• 

  Nature Fukushima ★★

  Abukuma Cave

  A short lit cave walk with an unusually wide range of formations.

• 

  Culture Akita ★★

  Ani Matagi Museum — Bear-hunting culture of the Akita mountains

  One of the few public collections of Akita's Matagi bear-hunting tradition.

• 

  Nature Iwate ★★

  Genbikei Gorge

  Rock drilled round by the river, and dumplings that arrive on a rope.

• 

  Nature Iwate ★★

  Goishi Coast — Sea-carved rock arches on the Sanriku shore

  Sea-cut arches, a booming rock and a black pebble beach, strung along one easy cliff path.

• 

  Onsen Yamagata ★★

  Hijiori Onsen — A snowbound cure-bath village inside a caldera

  A caldera cure-bath village where the morning market still feeds the inns' kitchens.

• 

  Culture Fukushima ★★

  Hinoemata Village — Farmers' kabuki and the road into Oze

  A thatched village stage where farmers' kabuki is still offered to the shrine three times a year.

• 

  Nature Akita ★★

  Kawarage Jigoku — A bare volcanic hillside still giving off steam

  A bare volcanic hillside with a hot-spring waterfall at the far end.

• 

  Culture Akita ★★

  Korakukan — Kosaka's Meiji-era playhouse

  A 1910 wooden theatre still playing, with a revolving stage turned by hand.

• 

  Local life Fukushima ★★

  Maezawa Magariya Village — A hamlet of L-shaped farmhouses in the Minamiaizu mountains

  A working hamlet of L-shaped thatched farmhouses, best seen between thaw and first snow.

• 

  Nature Yamagata ★★

  Maruike-sama — A spring-fed pond worshipped as a deity in Yuza

  Chokai's meltwater surfacing in one small pond that a shrine treats as its deity.

• 

  History Akita ★★

  Masuda Uchigura Storehouses — Snow-country merchant town in Yokote

  Merchant houses that keep their storehouses indoors, at the end of a corridor.

• 

  Nature Akita ★★

  Mototaki Fukuryusui Falls — Chokai's meltwater seeping from a wall of moss

  A whole rock wall of moss with spring water seeping straight out of it.

• 

  Culture Akita ★★

  Namahage — Oga's New Year's Eve visiting deities

  The one place the New Year's Eve rite is shown all year, masks and farmhouse together.

• 

  Entertainment Fukushima ★★

  Spa Resort Hawaiians — The hot-spring theme park a coal town built

  A tropical pool hall heated by the hot water that once flooded a coal mine.

• 

  Nature Fukushima ★★

  Tadami Line First Bridge Viewpoint

  A free ridge path looking down on the Tadami Line's signature arch.

• 

  Culture Iwate ★★

  Kappabuchi — Kappa pool behind Joken-ji temple in Tono

  Folk tales with an address: a stream, a shrine and a permit to catch a kappa.

• 

  Nature Fukushima ★★

  To-no-Hetsuri Cliffs — River-cut rock towers in the Aizu gorge

  A row of river-cut rock towers you can walk out to across a suspension bridge.

• 

  History Okayama ★★

  Bitchu Matsuyama Castle

  The only original castle keep in Japan that stands on a mountaintop.

• 

  History Hiroshima ★★

  Etajima Island — Home of the former Imperial Naval Academy

  The Imperial Navy's officer school, still walked with a guide.

• 

  Craft Okayama ★★

  Fukiya Furusato Village — A red-ochre mining village in the Okayama hills

  A whole hill village built to one colour, from the pigment it made.

• 

  Culture Okayama ★★

  Inujima — Island where a copper refinery became a museum

  An abandoned copper refinery turned into a museum without tidying the ruins away.

• 

  Local life Okayama ★★

  Katsuyama Noren Townscape — Dyed shop curtains along an old castle-town street

  A castle-town street where every house dyes a curtain of its own.

• 

  Local life Tottori ★★

  Kurayoshi White-Walled Storehouses — A preserved San'in merchant town on a canal

  One row of buildings with two faces, walkable as an easy loop.

• 

  Onsen Tottori ★★

  Misasa Onsen

  A radon spa town where the riverbed bath and the drinking spouts cost nothing.

• 

  History Tottori ★★

  Nageiredo at Mitokusan Sanbutsuji — A National Treasure hall wedged into a cliff

  A National Treasure on a cliff, with a roadside telescope for closed days.

• 

  Culture Okayama ★★

  Ohara Museum of Art

  Japan's first Western-art museum, standing on the willow-lined Kurashiki canal.

• 

  History Hiroshima ★★

  Onomichi Senkoji Temple

  Ride the ropeway up, then walk down through a temple and a town of stairways.

• 

  Nature Hiroshima ★★

  Taishakukyo Gorge

  A limestone canyon you walk to a natural stone arch.

• 

  History Hiroshima ★★

  Takehara Historic District

  A compact Edo salt town whose roofscape is best read from a temple stage above it.

• 

  Local life Okayama ★★

  Tsuyama Joto Townscape — Merchant quarter on the old Izumo highway

  One long merchant street of the Izumo highway, still lived in rather than staged.

• 

  History Okayama ★★

  Yakage-juku Post Town — Sanyodo post town with both of its old inns intact

  The one post town where a lord's inn and its back-up both still stand.

• 

  History Yamaguchi ★★

  Yanai Shirakabe Street — An Edo merchant row under red goldfish lanterns

  A national preservation district of white-walled merchant houses, still in daily use.

• 

  History Ehime ★★

  Besshi Copper Mine Tonaru Zone

  Brick ore bins deep in the mountains, on a road that shuts for the winter.

• 

  Culture Tokushima ★★

  Mount Bizan and Awa Odori Kaikan — Live Awa dance year-round, with a ropeway upstairs

  The August festival, staged on a weekday evening, with a ropeway on the fifth floor.

• 

  History Kagawa ★★

  Kasashima Historic District

  Kagawa's only preserved port town, a short ferry ride from Marugame.

• 

  Local life Tokushima ★★

  Kamikatsu Zero Waste Center

  A working waste station that lets you stand in it while the town sorts.

• 

  Local life Kagawa ★★

  Kotohira Monzen-machi — The shop town below the Kotohira-gu steps

  The steps start inside the shopping street — walk it, do not rush it.

• 

  History Kagawa ★★

  Marugame Castle

  Free to walk the stone walls; only the small keep charges.

• 

  Local life Tokushima ★★

  Ochiai Mountain Village — Iya's preserved village stacked up a mountainside

  A whole farming slope kept as it was built, and walkable from bottom to top.

• 

  Culture Kagawa ★★

  Ogijima and Megijima — Two islands off Takamatsu, one of them Onigashima

  Two Inland Sea islands on one ferry line, with an ogre's cave on the first.

• 

  History Ehime ★★

  Oyamazumi Shrine — Omishima's armour hall on the Shimanami Kaido

  The island shrine where most of Japan's designated arms and armour ended up.

• 

  History Ehime ★★

  Ozu Castle

  A timber keep among original turrets, above a castle town that costs nothing.

• 

  Nature Ehime ★★

  Sadamisaki Lighthouse

  Shikoku's westernmost point — a paved walk out to a white lighthouse above two seas.

• 

  Culture Kagawa ★★

  Sanagishima — Island of the double graves

  A folk burial custom still kept, on an island reached only by boat.

• 

  Food Kagawa ★★

  Sanuki Udon — Kagawa's wheat noodles, in central Takamatsu

  Kagawa's noodle culture, within one flat covered walk of Takamatsu Station.

• 

  Nature Kagawa ★★

  Shishijima's Great Camphor

  An old, wide-limbed camphor twenty minutes above a village with no cars.

• 

  Local life Ehime ★★

  Sotodomari Stone-Walled Village

  Dry-stone walls built to the eaves, in a village people still live in.

• 

  Local life Tokushima ★★

  Tebajima Fishing Village — An island off Mugi with a listed fishing quarter

  An entire fishing village kept intact, on an island with no cars.

• 

  History Tokushima ★★

  Wakimachi Udatsu Townscape — Indigo merchants' firewalls in Mima

  A street where the firewalls were the status symbol, and gave Japanese an idiom.

• 

  Nature Kagawa ★★

  Yashima — The flat-topped plateau above Takamatsu

  A level plateau of sea views, temple and gallery, reached by bus.

• 

  Local life Ehime ★★

  Yusu Mizugaura Terraced Fields

  A national cultural landscape that is still a working farm, an hour from Uwajima.

• 

  Local life Kagawa ★★

  Zenigata Sunae — A giant Edo coin raked into a Kagawa beach

  Wrong from the sand, right from the hill.

• 

  Culture Okinawa ★★

  Hamahiga Island — Sacred sites inside a working village, reached by road

  Ryukyuan creation-myth sites inside a lived-in island village, reachable by road.

• 

  History Okinawa ★★

  Izena Island

  The Second Sho dynasty's starting point, reached by a village boat.

• 

  History Okinawa ★★

  Kinjocho Stone-Paved Road

  A working residential street that is also the last stone of a royal road.

• 

  Local life Okinawa ★★

  Kohama Island — A cane-field island between Ishigaki and Iriomote

  A whole archipelago in one view, above cane fields and red tile.

• 

  Culture Okinawa ★★

  Kudaka Island

  The origin island of the Ryukyus, where knowing what not to do is the point.

• 

  Nature Okinawa ★★

  Kumejima — The island the Ryukyu court called Kumi

  An offshore sandbar with nothing built on it, and a stone pavement on the shore.

• 

  History Okinawa ★★

  Nakagusuku Castle Ruins

  Six enclosures, three masonry techniques, and walls that bend with the rock.

• 

  Food Okinawa ★★

  Senagajima Umikaji Terrace — Seaside shopping tiers on Senaga Island

  White stepped shopfronts over the sea, jets low overhead, and a west-facing sunset.

• 

  Culture Okinawa ★★

  Shikinaen Royal Garden

  A royal garden built for state guests, with Japan's highest scenic designation.

• 

  History Okinawa ★★

  Tamaudun Royal Mausoleum

  Okinawa's first National Treasure building, and the quiet half of Shuri.

• 

  Culture Okinawa ★★

  Tarama Island

  A grid of cane and fukugi, with two old watch mounds above it.

• 

  Nature Okinawa ★★

  Tokashiki Island — The largest of the Kerama Islands

  The clearest water within reach of Naha, on a boat you can catch after breakfast.

• 

  History Okinawa ★★

  Zakimi Castle Ruins

  A World Heritage gusuku with no gate, no ticket and no closing hour.

• 

  Nature Okinawa ★★

  Zamami Island

  Kerama-blue water inside the reach of one day out of Naha.

• 

  Nature Okinawa ★★

  Yonaguni Island

  Japan's western tip, where the country's last sunset lands.

• 

  Craft Okinawa ★★

  Tsuboya Yachimun Street — Naha's pottery lane of kilns and workshops

  A pottery quarter the war spared — still firing, still selling from its own kilns.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★

  Cape Erimo

  A visitor centre built around wind, where the Hidaka range walks into the Pacific.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★

  Cape Soya

  The top of the country, with a monument, a statue and a hill to climb behind it.

• 

  History Hokkaido ★★

  Matsumae Castle and Matsumae Han Yashiki — Hokkaido's only Japanese-style castle

  Hokkaido's only castle keep, with an Edo castle town rebuilt on the slope above it.

• 

  Food Hokkaido ★★

  Nikka Whisky Yoichi Distillery

  Coal-fired pot stills and Scottish-style stone buildings, minutes from the bus stop.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★

  Onuma Quasi-National Park — Lakes and wooded islets under a live volcano

  A live volcano, seen from footbridges instead of a car window.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★

  Rebun Island

  Alpine flowers at sea level, on marked walks with no bears to think about.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★

  Rishiri Island

  The whole island in one look, from a headland right beside the ferry pier.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★

  Shimamui Coast

  The clearest water on the Shakotan coast, seen from directly above it.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★

  Mount Showa-Shinzan

  One of the few volcanoes on earth whose entire birth was watched and drawn.

• 

  Onsen Hokkaido ★★

  Sunayu — The dig-your-own beach bath on Lake Kussharo

  A hot spring you have to dig for, on the shore of Japan's biggest caldera lake.

• 

  Onsen Hokkaido ★★

  Tokachigawa Onsen

  Plant-fed hot water, entered in a swimsuit at the town's own roadside station.

• 

  History Hokkaido ★★

  Esashi Inishie Kaido — Esashi's preserved merchant street

  A whole herring-era street, from a national Important Cultural Property to a shrine.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★

  Kiritappu Wetland Center

  A protected marsh you can still read properly on a bad-weather day.

• 

  History Hokkaido ★★

  Mashike Old Merchant Houses

  A whole Meiji street, one Important Cultural Property, and a station with no trains.

• 

  History Fukuoka ★★

  Akizuki Castle Town

  A cherry avenue ending at a black castle gate, all on foot from one bus stop.

• 

  Local life Fukuoka ★★

  Chikugo-Yoshii Townscape — Ukiha's white-plastered merchant streets

  White-plaster shopfronts along an old highway, walkable straight from a JR station.

• 

  Food Nagano ★★

  Daio Wasabi Farm

  Free to enter, and the water does the explaining for you.

• 

  Nature Shizuoka ★★

  Dogashima — Sea caves and a tidal bar on the west Izu coast

  A collapsed sea cave you can look down into and then sail through.

• 

  Nature Nagano ★★

  Happo Pond — An alpine pond on the open ridge above Hakuba

  Three lifts, one open ridge, and the Alps upside down in the water.

• 

  Local life Gifu ★★

  Hida Furukawa Setogawa Canal — A carp channel below white storehouse walls

  A working water channel with carp in it, in the town most people ride past.

• 

  History Nagasaki ★★

  Hirado Castle Town — The port where the Dutch ran their Japan factory

  A castle keep, a Dutch warehouse and a church above temple roofs, in one small port.

• 

  Local life Gifu ★★

  Iwamura Castle Town

  A preserved Edo merchant street below a ruined mountain castle.

• 

  Craft Nagano ★★

  Kiso-Hirasawa Lacquerware Town

  A designated townscape where the workshops behind the shopfronts are still working.

• 

  Local life Fukuoka ★★

  Kokura Castle & Tanga Market

  Market first while the stalls are full, castle after.

• 

  Food Shizuoka ★★

  Lake Hamana

  A brackish lake crossed by ropeway, in the water where eel farming started.

• 

  Nature Nagano ★★

  Lake Suwa

  One shore holds the lake, a hot bath and the overlook.

• 

  History Gifu ★★

  Mino Udatsu Townscape — Merchant firewalls raised on the paper trade

  Two streets of merchant firewalls, no two alike, on a line most people never take.

• 

  History Fukuoka ★★

  Munakata Taisha — The mainland shrine of the Okinoshima faith

  Three shrines, one closed island, and its treasures kept where you can see them.

• 

  History Fukuoka ★★

  Nanzoin Temple — Sasaguri's head temple of the reclining Buddha

  One of the world's largest bronze Buddhas, at a temple still run on prayer.

• 

  Food Nagano ★★

  Oyaki — Nagano's stuffed buns, eaten on the Zenkoji approach

  Nagano's everyday bun, finished over charcoal in a storehouse courtyard below Zenkoji.

• 

  Nature Fukuoka ★★

  Sakurai Futamigaura — Meoto-iwa and a white torii on the Genkai Sea

  Arrive mid-afternoon and start with the colour of the water.

• 

  Nature Nagano ★★

  Senjojiki Cirque — A glacier's bowl in the Central Alps, entered by ropeway

  A glacier's bowl with a station standing in the bottom of it.

• 

  Local life Nagano ★★

  Shimoguri no Sato — A hillside hamlet in the Toyamago valley

  A hillside village you see whole, from a deck in the forest across the ravine.

• 

  Food Shizuoka ★★

  Yui Fishing Port — Japan's sakura shrimp harbour on Suruga Bay

  The only bay in Japan that lands sakura shrimp, and the co-op counter sits right on the quay.

• 

  Nature Shizuoka ★★

  Sumatakyo Dream Suspension Bridge

  A walk-in-only suspension bridge over water that scatters blue light.

• 

  Nature Shizuoka ★★

  Jogasaki Coast

  Lava cliffs, a suspension bridge and a lighthouse on one cliff-top path.

• 

  Nature Okinawa ★★

  Aka Island — The middle island of the Kerama group

  The same Kerama water, one island short of where the boats empty.

• 

  Nature Miyagi ★★

  Akiu Great Falls

  One clean sheet of water, seen from the road above and from the stones below.

• 

  Nature Aomori ★★

  Cape Tappi

  Japan's only national road you climb on foot, at the tip of Tsugaru.

• 

  Local life Okinawa ★★

  Hatoma Island

  Walk the whole island between two boats.

• 

  Local life Okinawa ★★

  Henza and Miyagi Islands

  Drive the sea road, then climb to the fields above it.

• 

  History Shimane ★★

  Hinomisaki Shrine and Lighthouse — Vermilion shrine and stone tower on the cape west of Izumo

  A red two-level shrine and a climbable stone lighthouse on the same headland.

• 

  History Aomori ★★

  Hirosaki Nakacho Samurai District

  An Edo street plan, cypress hedges, and four samurai houses you enter for nothing.

• 

  Nature Aomori ★★

  Hotokegaura — Shimokita's rock coast, reached from the water

  A shore of buddha-shaped rock, reached only by boat or a steep path.

• 

  Local life Okinawa ★★

  Ie Island — Lily fields and one sharp peak off Motobu

  A whole island's history laid out flat, with one peak to read it from.

• 

  Nature Shimane ★★

  Iwami Tatamigaura — Raised sea floor on the Hamada coast

  A national natural monument you walk across, nodules and fossils in the open.

• 

  Craft Okinawa ★★

  Kijoka Bashofu Hall — Banana-fibre cloth woven in a northern Okinawan village

  The only village where this cloth is still made, showing its own work.

• 

  Nature Iwate ★★

  Kitayamazaki — Cliff-top viewpoints on the Sanriku coast of Iwate

  Look down on the cliffs from the top, then walk down the stair and look up at them.

• 

  Local life Aomori ★★

  Kuroishi Komise Street — Wooden arcades built against snow-country winters

  Snow-country arcades still standing in front of the houses that built them.

• 

  History Miyagi ★★

  Sairi Yashiki — A merchant family's storehouse estate in Marumori

  A whole merchant household, kept where it stood, in a town nobody passes through.

• 

  Local life Shimane ★★

  Aoishidatami Street — The blue stone approach at Mihonoseki

  A pilgrim's paving that only shows its colour in the rain.

• 

  Local life Yamaguchi ★★

  Mishima Island — Yamaguchi's northernmost island, out in the Sea of Japan

  An island where the timetable, not the map, sets the day.

• 

  Onsen Yamaguchi ★★

  Nagato Yumoto Onsen

  Yamaguchi's oldest spring, rebuilt as a town you walk end to end.

• 

  Nature Miyagi ★★

  Naruko Gorge

  A deep rock wall you look down into from an arched bridge, best near opening.

• 

  Nature Shimane ★★

  Oki Islands Global Geopark

  An island geopark where the sea crossing is part of the exhibit.

• 

  Local life Yamaguchi ★★

  Sasanami-ichi Post Town

  A nationally designated post town that is still a farming village.

• 

  Nature Aomori ★★

  Tanesashi Coast

  A national scenic site where lawn, not cliff, runs down to the Pacific.

• 

  Local life Miyagi ★★

  Tashirojima Cat Island

  A fishing island with a cat shrine on the ridge between two harbours.

• 

  History Miyagi ★★

  Toyoma Meiji Village — Tome's street of Meiji-era public buildings

  A whole Meiji streetscape still in use, walkable end to end.

• 

  Nature Aomori ★★

  Tsuru no Mai Bridge — Japan's longest three-arch wooden bridge

  Three cypress arches over still water, with Mount Iwaki filling the far end.

• 

  Nature Okinawa ★★

  Yambaru National Park

  The one building that explains the whole of Yambaru before you enter it.

• 

  Onsen Shimane ★★

  Yunotsu Onsen — A silver-port hot spring on the Sea of Japan

  A World Heritage silver port where the protected street is also the bathhouse street.

• 

  History Kochi ★★

  Aki Doi Kachu Samurai District — A castle-side retainers' quarter of hedged lanes

  A samurai quarter bounded by hedges rather than walls.

• 

  Local life Kagawa ★★

  Awashima Island — Three hills tied into one island off Mitoyo

  Three hills made into one island, with Japan's first school for seamen on it

• 

  History Nagano ★★

  Chikuni no Sho Museum — Barrier post on the old Salt Road

  A barrier post, a museum and a walkable stretch of old road, all in one place.

• 

  Entertainment Kanagawa ★★

  Fujiko F Fujio Museum — The Doraemon artist's museum in Kawasaki

  Doraemon's original drawings, on a ticket you book before you go.

• 

  Nature Okinawa ★★

  Gesashi Bay Mangrove Forest

  Mangrove you can walk into, without leaving the main island.

• 

  Entertainment Kanagawa ★★

  Yokohama Hakkeijima Sea Paradise — Aquarium and amusement island in Yokohama Bay

  Four aquariums and a sea-crossing coaster on one reclaimed island.

• 

  Local life Oita ★★

  Himeshima — A volcanic island of one village in the Seto Inland Sea

  A volcanic island you can ride around between two ferries.

• 

  Food Kochi ★★

  Hirome Market — Kochi's shared-table food hall

  One roof, dozens of counters, and tables nobody owns.

• 

  Nature Okinawa ★★

  Ikema Island — A wildlife reserve island north of Miyako

  Cross for the bridge, then stay for the reed wetland at the island's centre.

• 

  Nature Tokyo ★★

  Inokashira Park

  A spring-fed pond with boats, a shrine island and the Kanda River's source.

• 

  Local life Yamaguchi ★★

  Iwaishima — The stone-walled island out in the Suo Sea

  Walls built against the winter wind, still standing at eaves height.

• 

  Local life Ehime ★★

  Iwamatsu Historic Townscape — Uwajima's newest preservation district by the river

  A preservation district you walk through while it is still being lived in

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★

  Kaiyodai Observatory — Lookout over the Konsen dairy plateau

  A working dairy plateau seen whole, from a deck that never locks.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★

  Kaminoko Pond — A spring-fed blue pool on the back road to Lake Mashu

  A blue spring pond at the end of a gravel road, paired with Mashu's quieter lookout.

• 

  History Hokkaido ★★

  Katsuyamadate Site — A fifteenth-century hillside stronghold above Kaminokuni

  Ainu tools and imported porcelain out of one hillside.

• 

  Nature Kochi ★★

  Kashiwajima Island — Kochi's clearest water, at the prefecture's western tip

  Water clear enough to read the seabed, off a village that still fishes.

• 

  History Kochi ★★

  Kiragawa Townscape — A charcoal port's white walls in eastern Kochi

  A town that wrote its typhoons into its walls.

• 

  Craft Gunma ★★

  Kiryu Shinmachi — The preserved core of a silk-weaving town

  A whole quarter still standing on the plot lines of its founding.

• 

  History Oita ★★

  Kitsuki Castle Town

  Two samurai hills and a merchant valley joined by stone slopes.

• 

  Nature Tokyo ★★

  Koishikawa Korakuen Garden

  Edo landscape design, borrowed Chinese scenery and a stadium roof in one view.

• 

  Nature Kagoshima ★★

  Koshikishima Islands — an island chain off Satsumasendai

  Three islands, one road — cliffs, lagoons and a long bridge between them.

• 

  History Wakayama ★★

  Kumano Kodo Nakahechi — the mountain gateway at Takijiri-oji

  The pilgrim road's real gate — reached by bus, walkable in half a day.

• 

  Food Kochi ★★

  Kure Taishomachi Market

  A fishing town's own market, still trading under one arcade roof.

• 

  Local life Okinawa ★★

  Kurima Island — A farm island at the end of Kurima Bridge

  One village, one bridge, and a lookout that shows you both at once.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★

  Kyogoku Fukidashi Park — Hokkaido's meltwater spring on the hundred-waters list

  Famous water you can actually put in a bottle and carry off.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★

  Lake Okotanpe

  One of Hokkaido's three secret lakes, seen from the road and nowhere else.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★

  Lake Shikaribetsu — A mountain lake inside Daisetsuzan National Park

  Hokkaido's highest lake, clear in summer and carrying a village of ice in winter.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★

  Lake Shumarinai

  Japan's largest man-made lake, with a bus that stops at the water's edge.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★

  Lake Toyoni

  A heart-shaped lake at the end of a forest road, inside Japan's largest national park.

• 

  History Oita ★★

  Hita Mameda-machi — An Edo merchant quarter in inland Oita

  An Edo merchant town whose grid was drawn by the shogunate's own office.

• 

  History Shiga ★★

  Miidera Temple

  A National Treasure hillside temple above Lake Biwa, half an hour east of Kyoto.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★

  Mikasa Geopark

  Ammonites and a coal-mine winding frame inside one hour's walk.

• 

  Nature Okinawa ★★

  Minna Island — The crescent island off the Motobu peninsula

  A crescent island a quarter of an hour offshore, small enough to walk in a day.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★

  Mt. Apoi Geopark — Mantle rock at the south end of the Hidaka range

  Mantle rock at sea level, with a free visitor centre that decodes it.

• 

  Onsen Oita ★★

  Nagayu Onsen — Carbonated hot springs in the Serikawa valley

  Cool carbonated water you sit in slowly and drink between soaks.

• 

  History Tokyo ★★

  Nihonbashi Bridge — Tokyo's road-origin bridge and its winged kirin

  Japan's kilometre zero, with winged kirin and a plate set into the road.

• 

  History Nagasaki ★★

  Former Nokubi Church — A brick chapel left on an island with no residents

  A World Heritage church on an island where nobody lives.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★

  Notsuke Peninsula — The Todowara dead forest on an Okhotsk sand spit

  A landscape you can watch being handed back to the sea.

• 

  Culture Okinawa ★★

  Ogami Island — An island of prayer off northern Miyako

  A lived-in sacred island where the rules, not the sights, shape the visit.

• 

  Local life Kochi ★★

  Okinoshima — Kochi's granite island of stone-walled lanes

  Two villages built on piled stone, an hour of open sea from the mainland.

• 

  Local life Hokkaido ★★

  Okushiri Island

  Wine, sea urchin and a memorial to the wave, on one island.

• 

  Culture Osaka ★★

  Osaka Tenmangu Shrine

  The shrine behind Osaka's great summer festival, calm on an ordinary weekday morning.

• 

  Food Okinawa ★★

  Ou Island — The bridge-linked fishing island of Nanjo

  Okinawan tempura eaten where the boats land it.

• 

  History Kanagawa ★★

  Oyama Afuri Shrine — Shinto shrine on Mount Oyama

  A mountain shrine six cable-car minutes above a lane of top-makers' shops.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★

  Sarobetsu Plain — Japan's largest raised bog, walked on a boardwalk

  Japan's largest raised bog, on a flat boardwalk that never closes.

• 

  History Mie ★★

  Seki-juku — A surviving Tokaido post town in Mie

  The rare Tokaido post town you can still read as one continuous street.

• 

  Nature Okinawa ★★

  Sesoko Island — A bridge-linked island off the Motobu peninsula

  Island water you can reach without a timetable.

• 

  Local life Tokyo ★★

  Shibamata Taishakuten — Tokyo's Tora-san temple and its dango-lined approach

  A wooden temple lane protected as a national cultural landscape.

• 

  Onsen Tochigi ★★

  Shiobara Onsen — Tochigi's thousand-year hot-spring valley

  Eleven springs, six water types and a gorge you cross on footbridges.

• 

  History Hokkaido ★★

  Taushubetsu River Bridge — Drowned railway arch on Lake Nukabira

  A railway arch with a season of its own, seen free from the highway lookout.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★

  Teuri and Yagishiri Islands

  Japan's last murre cliff and a wind-bent yew forest, on one ticket.

• 

  History Wakayama ★★

  Tomogashima Islands — Meiji fort ruins on an island off Kada

  An abandoned brick fortress on an uninhabited island, twenty minutes off the Wakayama coast.

• 

  Local life Okinawa ★★

  Tonaki Island — One of only two preserved village districts in Okinawa

  A whole village listed as a monument, and a timetable that decides your visit.

• 

  Food Kochi ★★

  Umaji Village — Kochi's yuzu village in the cedar mountains

  A famous product still made on the street it came from.

• 

  Nature Oita ★★

  Yabakei Gorge

  A gorge whose most famous feature was dug through the cliff by one man.

• 

  History Hokkaido ★★

  Yubari Coal Mine Museum

  A mine gallery with the real seam still in the wall.

• 

  Nature Okinawa ★★

  Yubu Island — A whole island run as a subtropical garden

  A garden you reach by wading, at the pace of an ox.

• 

  Culture Kochi ★★

  Yusuhara — Kengo Kuma's cedar buildings in a mountain town

  Public buildings worth the trip, and none of them charge.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★

  Nonomiya Shrine

  The oldest form of torii, on Kyoto's most-walked bamboo path.

• 

  Craft Shimane ★★

  Okuizumo Tatara Ironmaking Country — Home of the tamahagane steel used for Japanese swords

  Japan's iron country, where old mining scars became rice terraces and steel is still made.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★

  Tsurui Crane Feeding Grounds

  Winter only, free to watch, and the cranes are genuinely wild.

• 

  History Fukuoka ★★

  Yame Fukushima Historic Merchant Town

  A living merchant street of white plaster, walkable end to end in one afternoon.

• 

  History Aomori ★★

  Kamegaoka Stone Age Site

  Where the goggle-eyed dogu came out of the ground — open field, no fee.

• 

  Food Chiba ★★

  Katsuura Morning Market

  One of Japan's three great morning markets, still run by the people who catch and grow.

• 

  History Chiba ★★

  Nakayama Hokekyoji Temple Approach

  Black gate, temple town, then a red pagoda — all one walk.

• 

  History Akita ★★

  Oyu Stone Circles

  Japan's Jomon World Heritage at its plainest: two stone rings in open grass.

• 

  History Chiba ★★

  Tojo-tei Residence — The last Tokugawa lord's villa in Matsudo

  A Tokugawa family's own Meiji house and garden, both still whole, near Tokyo.

• 

  Nature Chiba ★★

  Byobugaura Cliffs

  A protected wall of sea cliff, walked from below on a paved shore path.

• 

  Food Chiba ★★

  Choshi Soy Sauce — Chiba's other brewing town, at the Tone river mouth

  Two soy houses from the 1600s at the Tone's mouth, one of them open by reservation.

• 

  Nature Chiba ★★

  Kameiwa Cave and Nomizo Falls

  An Edo-period water tunnel that turns the equinox sunrise into a heart on the water.

• 

  History Chiba ★★

  Katori Jingu Shrine

  Head shrine of the Katori shrines — cedars, black lacquer and a brand-new torii.

• 

  Craft Ehime ★★

  Tobe Ware Village — Ehime's blue-and-white porcelain district

  Japan's blue-and-white porcelain seen at its source, an hour from Matsuyama by city bus.

• 

  History Ehime ★★

  Unomachi Historic District

  A whole preserved country town, free to walk, ten minutes from a limited-express stop.

• 

  History Fukushima ★★

  Aizu Sazaedo — Double-helix wooden hall on Iimoriyama

  A wooden spiral you actually walk, and one of very few anywhere.

• 

  Local life Gunma ★★

  Kuni-Akaiwa Village — Gunma's first preservation district, built on silk

  A whole street of silk-farm houses, still occupied, at the head of a valley.

• 

  History Gunma ★★

  Apt-no-Michi Rail Trail — The abandoned Usui Pass line, walked end to end

  A dead mountain railway you walk through, tunnels and arches included.

• 

  Craft Gunma ★★

  Shorinzan Darumaji Temple — Birthplace of Japan's wish-making daruma dolls

  Where Japan's red wishing doll started, and where the country's dolls still gather.

• 

  Craft Gunma ★★

  Tajima Yahei Sericulture Farm

  A World Heritage farmhouse still lived in — free, and read from the yard.

• 

  Nature Hiroshima ★★

  Takataniyama Observatory — Miyoshi's dawn sea of river fog

  A whole basin under fog at dawn, with a webcam to check it first.

• 

  Onsen Hiroshima ★★

  Yuki Onsen

  A soft, low-temperature spring in a river valley inside Hiroshima city.

• 

  Food Hokkaido ★★

  Akkeshi Oysters — Eaten at the roadside station above the bay

  Buy oysters on the market floor, then grill them upstairs over charcoal.

• 

  Food Ibaraki ★★

  Hoshiimo — Ibaraki's dried sweet potato and the coast it came from

  Japan's dried sweet potato, met on the coast that makes it.

• 

  Culture Hokkaido ★★

  Ikutora Station — Horomai Station from the film Poppoya

  A wooden station kept exactly as a film left it, minus the trains.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★

  Lake Utonai

  A Ramsar lake and Japan's first bird sanctuary, minutes from the airport.

• 

  History Ibaraki ★★

  Makabe Historic Townscape

  A nationally designated storehouse town read from the street, not from a museum.

• 

  Local life Hokkaido ★★

  Naitai Highland Farm

  Japan's largest public pasture, with a road to the ridge and the Tokachi plain below.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★

  Uryunuma Wetland

  A Ramsar highmoor reached only on foot, open a few months a year.

• 

  Craft Ibaraki ★★

  Yuki-tsumugi Silk — Ibaraki's UNESCO-listed hand-spun silk

  A UNESCO-listed silk shown where it is traded, with the grounds free to enter.

• 

  Food Aichi ★★

  Hitsumabushi — Nagoya's grilled eel, eaten three ways

  Nagoya's three-way eel, eaten in the harbour town that invented it.

• 

  History Aichi ★★

  Okazaki Castle

  The castle a shogun was born in, with its oldest stonework out in the free park.

• 

  Local life Aichi ★★

  Osu Shopping District

  A roofed arcade grid you can walk end to end in any weather.

• 

  Nature Aichi ★★

  Port of Nagoya Public Aquarium

  One pool, two viewpoints — the deck above and an underwater window below.

• 

  Culture Aichi ★★

  SCMaglev and Railway Park — JR Central's railway museum at Kinjo Futo

  Three world speed records in one room, then the trains that closed the gaps.

• 

  Craft Aichi ★★

  Seto Ware — The kiln town that named Japan's crockery

  A public lane where a thousand years of kiln waste holds the town up.

• 

  Culture Aichi ★★

  Tokugawa Art Museum

  One daimyo house's own belongings, shown in the rooms they were used in.

• 

  History Aichi ★★

  Toyokawa Inari — Soto Zen temple, not a shrine

  A Zen temple wearing a fox shrine's face, straight out of the station.

• 

  Culture Aomori ★★

  Aomori Museum of Art

  Bare earth and white cube, two ways of showing art in one building

• 

  Food Chiba ★★

  Boshu Loquats — Minamiboso's loquat country and its roadside station

  The easiest way to stand inside a named Japanese fruit district without a car

• 

  Craft Chiba ★★

  Boshu Uchiwa Fans — Chiba's round-handled fan and the hall by Iwai Station

  A craft you can watch being made, at the station door

• 

  Nature Akita ★★

  Dakigaeri Gorge

  A river-level path through blue water and cliffs, entered across a red suspension bridge.

• 

  Food Aomori ★★

  Hachinohe Senbei-jiru — A soup-cracker hotpot, met at the Hasshoku market

  A pot dish and a market street, one bus ride from the Shinkansen station.

• 

  Food Akita ★★

  Hatahata Sandfish — Akita's winter fish and the sauce it becomes

  Akita's winter fish, bought off the ice at the end of the line.

• 

  Food Akita ★★

  Iburigakko — Akita's daikon, smoked before it is pickled

  Akita's smoked pickle, read against the whole shelf it came from.

• 

  History Ehime ★★

  Imabari Castle — A sea castle whose moat runs on the tide

  A moat open to the sea, with fish that ride in on the tide.

• 

  Nature Aomori ★★

  Kabushima — A seabird colony nesting right beside a shrine

  The one seabird colony in Japan you stand inside rather than scan from a headland.

• 

  Nature Chiba ★★

  Kujukuri Beach

  The one place where the whole arc of the beach fits into a single view.

• 

  Food Aomori ★★

  Mutsu Bay Scallops — The nokkedon market behind Aomori Station

  Build your own bowl from the morning trays, a short walk from the station.

• 

  Craft Akita ★★

  Odate Magewappa — Bentwood ware of Akita cedar sewn with cherry bark

  A cedar-lined room where the lunch box is the smallest of the shapes.

• 

  Craft Aichi ★★

  Owari Cloisonne — Aichi's silver-wired enamel craft

  A craft town where the whole enamelling sequence sits in one building.

• 

  Culture Aomori ★★

  Tachineputa Hall — Goshogawara's year-round home for its giant neputa floats

  Festival floats you would otherwise glimpse for one night, standing still indoors.

• 

  Onsen Akita ★★

  Tamagawa Onsen

  Japan's largest single hot-spring vent, walked on a paved loop.

• 

  Food Aomori ★★

  Tatehana Wharf Morning Market

  One long row of stalls on a fishing quay, open only on Sunday mornings.

• 

  Culture Aomori ★★

  Towada Art Center

  Half the collection stands on a public street and never closes

• 

  Craft Aomori ★★

  Tsugaru Lacquerware

  The whole making of a Tsugaru lacquer bowl, laid out in one free room.

• 

  Culture Akita ★★

  Yokote Kamakura Snow Festival — Snow rooms of Akita, not the coastal city of the same name

  Two February evenings of lit snow rooms, and one kept cold all year.

• 

  History Fukui ★★

  Echizen Ono Castle

  A keep everyone reaches on foot, and a sea of cloud watched from the hill opposite.

• 

  Craft Fukui ★★

  Echizen Forged Blades — The cooperative forge at Takefu Knife Village

  A working forge you can look down into for free — best on a weekday.

• 

  Entertainment Fukuoka ★★

  Fukuoka Tower

  Hakata Bay on one side, the whole city on the other, best an hour before dark.

• 

  History Fukuoka ★★

  Hakozakigu Shrine

  A shrine built to face the sea, best entered from its beach.

• 

  History Fukui ★★

  Heisenji Hakusan Shrine — Moss-covered grounds of a vanished temple city

  A whole medieval temple town, now readable only as moss, stone and terraces.

• 

  History Fukuoka ★★

  Hikosan Jingu — Shrine hall on one of Japan's three Shugendo mountains

  A stone approach through the ruins of a mountain order, ending at a great hall.

• 

  Nature Fukuoka ★★

  Hiraodai Karst Plateau

  Limestone grassland above Kitakyushu, with a walk-in stream cave beneath it.

• 

  History Ehime ★★

  Ishiteji Temple

  A National Treasure gate and a live pilgrim route, next door to Dogo Onsen.

• 

  Nature Fukuoka ★★

  Kawachi Fujien Wisteria Garden

  Two wisteria tunnels and a walk-in dome, open only a few weeks a year.

• 

  History Fukui ★★

  Kehi Jingu Shrine

  One of Japan's three great wooden torii, a fifteen-minute walk from a Shinkansen platform.

• 

  Culture Fukuoka ★★

  Kyushu National Museum

  A national museum entered through a lit tunnel from a shrine's grounds.

• 

  History Fukui ★★

  Maruoka Castle

  The only original keep in Hokuriku, roofed in stone against the snow.

• 

  History Fukuoka ★★

  Miyanohara Pit — The Miike colliery shaft on the World Heritage list

  A Meiji pit head left standing where it worked, machinery and all.

• 

  Craft Fukui ★★

  Sabae Eyewear — The town that makes most of Japan's frames

  The one place in Japan's eyewear capital actually set up to receive outsiders.

• 

  Nature Fukuoka ★★

  Mount Sarakura

  Cable car and slope car straight up to one of Japan's best-known night views.

• 

  Food Ehime ★★

  Uwajima Taimeshi — Raw sea bream and egg over rice, in southern Ehime

  The raw version of Ehime's sea bream rice, served without a reservation beside the port.

• 

  Craft Ehime ★★

  Uwa Sea Akoya Pearls — Ehime's pearl coast, entered at a roadside hall

  Japan's largest pearl harvest, shown free beside the highway.

• 

  Craft Fukui ★★

  Wakasa Lacquered Chopsticks — The chopstick makers' showroom in Obama

  Free to enter, and you grind your own pair out of the layers.

• 

  Food Akita ★★

  Yokote Yakisoba — Akita's fried noodles under a soft fried egg

  Akita's griddle noodle, eaten at a stop on the road it grew up beside.

• 

  History Fukushima ★★

  Aizu Bukeyashiki — An open-air museum of Aizu samurai buildings

  A retainer's household rebuilt room by room — the floor plan is the exhibit, not one grand hall.

• 

  Craft Fukushima ★★

  Aizu Lacquerware

  Lacquer you can pick up and compare, in the quarter that has always sold it.

• 

  Nature Fukushima ★★

  Bandai-Azuma Skyline — A volcanic mountain road above Fukushima

  Not a drive-through — park at Jododaira and the crater rim is a short climb.

• 

  Onsen Fukushima ★★

  Higashiyama Onsen — Aizu-Wakamatsu's hot-spring town on the Yugawa

  A working hot-spring town you can walk end to end, 15 min from the castle-town station.

• 

  Craft Fukuoka ★★

  Koishiwara Ware — Fukuoka's mountain pottery village

  Compare every kiln in the valley in one room, then drive to the ones you want.

• 

  Nature Gunma ★★

  Lake Haruna

  A caldera you can walk around in an afternoon, with its own volcano in the middle.

• 

  Nature Fukushima ★★

  Lake Inawashiro

  A famous lake with a real landing: shore, pier and villa in one stop.

• 

  Nature Fukushima ★★

  Miharu Takizakura — One of Japan's three great cherry trees

  One of Japan's three great cherries, ticketed for two weeks and free the rest of the year.

• 

  Nature Gunma ★★

  Onioshidashien Lava Park

  Raw volcanic ground you can cross on paved paths, an easy bus ride from Karuizawa.

• 

  Craft Gifu ★★

  Seki Cutlery — Japan's knife town, on one short street

  Japan's knife town, gathered into one short street beside a country station.

• 

  Food Fukushima ★★

  Shirakawa Ramen — Hand-cut soy-sauce noodles of southern Fukushima

  A national ramen name where the real problem is finding the shop — and the station solves it.

• 

  History Gunma ★★

  Takasaki Byakue Dai-Kannon — A hilltop Kannon statue you climb inside

  A giant white Kannon you can climb, with a whole hill of walks around its feet.

• 

  Nature Gifu ★★

  Yoro Falls

  A named waterfall at the top of a wooded valley walk.

• 

  History Hokkaido ★★

  Former Hokkaido Government Office — Akarenga, the red brick landmark of central Sapporo

  Sapporo's red brick landmark is open again, and its tower balcony now takes visitors.

• 

  History Hiroshima ★★

  Fukuyama Castle

  Walk round to the back of the keep: that wall exists nowhere else.

• 

  History Hiroshima ★★

  Hiroshima Castle

  Come for the moat circuit and the free turret corridor, not the view from the top.

• 

  Local life Hokkaido ★★

  Hitsujigaoka Observation Hill

  A national research farm's hilltop, with Sapporo standing behind grazing sheep.

• 

  Food Gifu ★★

  Hoba Miso — Hida's miso grilled on a magnolia leaf

  Hida's hearth dish, understood best in the room it came from.

• 

  Culture Hiroshima ★★

  Kosanji Temple and Miraishin no Oka — Setoda's replica halls and marble hilltop

  Two opposite aesthetics inside one precinct, reached by boat rather than bridge.

• 

  Culture Hiroshima ★★

  Mazda Museum

  A free, booked-ahead museum with a walkway over a live assembly line.

• 

  Onsen Gunma ★★

  Minakami Onsen

  A spa town you can bathe in for the day, with a gorge walk attached to it.

• 

  Food Hiroshima ★★

  Saijo Sakagura-dori — Higashi-Hiroshima's street of sake breweries

  A sake district that starts at the ticket gate and fits into one street.

• 

  Nature Hiroshima ★★

  Shukkeien Garden

  Do it with the castle in the same morning — the two sit a short walk apart.

• 

  Food Gunma ★★

  Tsumagoi Highland Cabbage

  Working farmland at scale, with a built viewpoint that lets you stop and look at it.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★

  Drift Ice Icebreaker Aurora — Abashiri's winter run into the Okhotsk pack ice

  The southern limit of the world's sea ice, entered by boat.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★

  Bihoro Pass

  The one stop in east Hokkaido where a whole caldera lake fits in a single look.

• 

  History Hokkaido ★★

  Old Public Hall of Hakodate Ward

  A Meiji hall above the slopes, and the right order to walk the hillside.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★

  Mount Io Atosanupuri — The steaming sulphur ground above Kawayu Onsen

  Ordinary shoes are enough to bring you level with a working vent.

• 

  History Hokkaido ★★

  Historical Village of Hokkaido — Sapporo's open-air museum of pioneer buildings

  A whole settlement-era town rebuilt in a forest, with a horse tram down the main street.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★

  Kamuiwakka Hot Falls

  Hot-spring water over bare rock, and a road that decides whether you arrive.

• 

  Food Hokkaido ★★

  Nijo Market

  A working fish market in the middle of Sapporo, reached on foot from Odori.

• 

  Entertainment Hokkaido ★★

  Okurayama Ski Jump Stadium

  Ride a lift to the top of an Olympic hill and look straight down at Sapporo.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★

  Oshinkoshin Falls

  The peninsula's biggest waterfall, and it asks for no walk at all.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★

  Shiretoko Pass

  The only road over Shiretoko, at its highest point, open half the year.

• 

  Craft Hokkaido ★★

  Asahikawa Furniture — Hokkaido's hardwood furniture region

  One building holds a whole furniture region, and weekends add a workbench.

• 

  Entertainment Hokkaido ★★

  Banei Tokachi at Obihiro Racecourse — The world's only draft-horse sled racing

  Racing slow enough to walk beside, and here you are allowed to.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★

  Cape Nosappu

  The east end of Japan's mainland, free to walk and at its best at sunrise.

• 

  Food Hokkaido ★★

  Horokanai Soba — Buckwheat country served at its roadside station

  Japan's biggest buckwheat district, with hand-cut soba and a hot spring at one stop.

• 

  Onsen Hokkaido ★★

  Kawayu Onsen — A strongly acidic spa town in Akan-Mashu National Park

  A national-park spa town with rare acidic water and a level walk to a live crater.

• 

  Local life Hokkaido ★★

  Kofuku Station — A closed halt on the old Hiroo Line

  A country halt kept for its name, its wall of tickets and two orange railcars.

• 

  Food Hokkaido ★★

  Mukawa Shishamo — The michi-no-eki at the centre of shishamo country

  The home town of the real shishamo, and an honest look at how it is doing.

• 

  Food Hokkaido ★★

  Muroran Yakitori — Pork and onion skewers served with mustard

  Order the pork-and-onion skewers in the lounge, then take the deck for the bridge.

• 

  Culture Hokkaido ★★

  Nusamai Bridge

  Kushiro's sunset, seen over bronze seasons, at the end of a flat walk from the station.

• 

  Food Hokkaido ★★

  Sarufutsu Scallops — Japan's top scallop village on the Okhotsk coast

  Scallops eaten beside the water they came from, with the bus stopping at the gate.

• 

  Food Hokkaido ★★

  Ikeda Wine Castle — Japan's first town-run winery, above the Tokachi plain

  Japan's first town-run winery, free to walk from the cellar to the roof.

• 

  Nature Hokkaido ★★

  Unkai Terrace — A cloud-viewing deck above Tomamu

  Set an alarm, ride up in the dark, and see what the valley did overnight.

• 

  Food Hokkaido ★★

  Zangi — Hokkaido's soy-marinated fried chicken

  Hokkaido's fried chicken, eaten in the city that named it.

• 

  History Hyogo ★★

  Ako Castle and Oishi Shrine — The Chushingura castle town on the Harima coast

  One famous story, walkable in order from the station to the gate.

• 

  History Hyogo ★★

  Amarube Sky Station — Walkway on the piers of a former railway trestle

  A railway trestle left standing, and opened as a free walkway above the sea.

• 

  Nature Ibaraki ★★

  Aqua World Oarai Aquarium

  Japan's widest shark collection, a short ride from Mito on the Pacific coast.

• 

  Food Hyogo ★★

  Awaji Island Onions — tasted at the hilltop hall above Naruto Strait

  The island's famous onion, somewhere you can finally walk in and eat it.

• 

  History Hyogo ★★

  Izanagi Jingu Shrine

  Awaji's first shrine, free and open all day, minutes from the Kobe bus.

• 

  Onsen Ishikawa ★★

  Kaga Onsen Villages

  Four spa towns, four public baths — no ryokan booking needed to get in the water.

• 

  History Hokkaido ★★

  Kitami Mint Memorial Museum

  A free industry museum where the smell is the exhibit.

• 

  History Ibaraki ★★

  Kodokan Mito Domain School

  Mito's domain school, still standing a short walk from the station.

• 

  Local life Ishikawa ★★

  Nagamachi Samurai District

  Free public lanes where earth walls, canal and three ranks of samurai housing line up.

• 

  Craft Hokkaido ★★

  Nibutani Ainu Culture Museum

  Two nationally designated crafts, seen in the valley that still makes them.

• 

  Entertainment Hyogo ★★

  Takarazuka Grand Theater

  A world-famous stage where the promenade and museum floors need no ticket.

• 

  Craft Fukuoka ★★

  Hakata Dolls

  A free room by Hakata Station where the city's painted clay dolls are shown and explained.

• 

  Craft Fukuoka ★★

  Hakata-ori Textile — Fukuoka's silk obi weave

  One lane holds both the finished Hakata-ori and the stone that names its founder.

• 

  Craft Akita ★★

  Kakunodate Kabazaiku — Cherry-bark craft at the top of the samurai street

  The winter trade that paid for the samurai street, still being worked indoors.

• 

  History Gifu ★★

  Takayama Jinya — Japan's only surviving shogunate magistrate's office

  The one magistrate's office the shogunate left standing, with a market at its gate.

• 

  History Fukuoka ★★

  Tochoji Temple

  A wooden Great Buddha with a dark passage under it, one stop from Hakata.

• 

  Food Aichi ★★

  Nagoya Uiro — Steamed rice-flour sweet sold by the Shinkansen gate

  The sweet the Shinkansen carried, bought where the Shinkansen stops.

• 

  Nature Iwate ★★

  Hachimantai — Volcanic plateau of crater ponds and boardwalk

  Alpine moor, crater ponds and a spring ice ring, reached by road rather than by climb.

• 

  History Iwate ★★

  Hashino Iron Mining and Smelting Site

  A UNESCO World Heritage site you walk into free, deep in a Sanriku valley.

• 

  Culture Kagawa ★★

  Isamu Noguchi Garden Museum

  A sculptor's studio kept as he used it, opened three days a week by reservation.

• 

  Nature Kagoshima ★★

  Izumi Crane Observation Center

  Japan's biggest crane winter, seen from a rooftop right at the edge of the roost.

• 

  History Hokkaido ★★

  Kanemori Red Brick Warehouse — Hakodate's bayside warehouse quarter

  Free to walk, four venues deep, with Mount Hakodate standing right behind the roofline.

• 

  Local life Iwate ★★

  Koiwai Farm

  Working heritage barns and one famous cherry, on open pasture under Mount Iwate.

• 

  Craft Hiroshima ★★

  Miyajima Woodcraft — Rice scoops and carved trays at the island crafts hall

  The island's scoop and carving trade, shown as a craft rather than a souvenir.

• 

  Food Iwate ★★

  Nambu Senbei — Iwate's wheat cracker baked in iron moulds

  A free craft village where Iwate's iron-mould cracker is still baked by hand.

• 

  Local life Iwate ★★

  Sanriku Railway Rias Line

  A working local line that follows the Pacific the whole way, with view stops built in.

• 

  Entertainment Hokkaido ★★

  Sapporo TV Tower

  A landmark you can also go up — open late, straight above the park's axis.

• 

  Food Kagawa ★★

  Marukin Soy Sauce Museum

  A whole soy sauce town still standing, with one building that opens its doors.

• 

  History Kagawa ★★

  Takamatsu Castle

  A castle whose moat rises and falls with the Inland Sea, minutes from the station.

• 

  History Kagawa ★★

  Takaya Shrine Sky Torii

  A summit gate over the Inland Sea, with a real climb attached.

• 

  History Iwate ★★

  Takkoku no Iwaya Bishamondo — Cliff-set hall of Bishamonten west of Hiraizumi

  A hall built into a cliff and a Buddha cut into the rock, a short ride west of Hiraizumi.

• 

  Culture Kagoshima ★★

  Tanegashima Space Center

  Japan's largest launch site, with a free museum on the public side of the fence.

• 

  History Kagawa ★★

  Zentsuji Temple

  Kukai's birthplace, free to walk, with the Garan open from seven.

• 

  Food Hiroshima ★★

  Anagomeshi on Miyajima Omotesando — Grilled conger eel over rice, Hiroshima's island dish

  The island's signature bowl, on the lane between the pier and the shrine.

• 

  History Kumamoto ★★

  Aoi Aso Shrine

  Five linked buildings under one steep thatch, and all of it National Treasure.

• 

  Nature Kochi ★★

  Mount Godaisan — Kochi's hilltop temple and botanical garden

  A pilgrimage temple and a botanical garden on one hill, reached by a single bus.

• 

  Nature Kumamoto ★★

  Kikuchi Gorge

  Volcanic groundwater falling through old forest — cold even in August.

• 

  Onsen Kagoshima ★★

  Kirishima Onsen Village

  Nine springs on one volcano, with a market and a footbath where the bus stops.

• 

  Craft Kagawa ★★

  Marugame Uchiwa Museum — Japan's round bamboo fan made here

  A free room where Japan's fan trade is still worked by hand in front of you.

• 

  Nature Kagoshima ★★

  Mount Kaimon

  A cone you walk up in a spiral, with the sea turning around you.

• 

  Culture Kanagawa ★★

  Pola Museum of Art

  A major Impressionist collection hidden under a Hakone forest, with a boardwalk through it.

• 

  Nature Kochi ★★

  Shikoku Karst Tengu Plateau

  The one stretch of the Shikoku Karst built for stopping, walking and staying the night.

• 

  History Kagawa ★★

  Shikoku Mura Museum

  Four prefectures' worth of old buildings, rebuilt along one hillside path.

• 

  Food Kanagawa ★★

  Shin-Yokohama Ramen Museum

  A whole Showa street rebuilt indoors, with ramen counters in the shopfronts.

• 

  Culture Kumamoto ★★

  Suizenji Jojuen Garden

  A Hosokawa daimyo garden built on Aso spring water, ten minutes from a JR station.

• 

  Culture Kochi ★★

  Yosakoi Festival — Kochi's four-day August dance contest

  Four August days when central Kochi becomes an open-air dance contest, free to watch.

• 

  Nature Mie ★★

  Akame 48 Waterfalls

  Named falls in sequence along one riverside path — turn back whenever you like.

• 

  History Kumamoto ★★

  Aso Shrine Romon Gate

  A rebuilt gate, an approach that runs sideways, and spring water on the way out.

• 

  Craft Mie ★★

  Banko Ware — Yokkaichi's heat-proof pottery

  The town behind Japan's clay pots, with a display room, a studio and a kiln-direct shop.

• 

  Onsen Mie ★★

  Mount Gozaisho and Yunoyama Onsen

  One ropeway turns a spa village and a mountain ridge into a single outing.

• 

  Nature Kyoto ★★

  Hozugawa River Boat Ride

  Arrive in Arashiyama by river, poled through a gorge no road follows.

• 

  History Mie ★★

  Iga Ueno Castle and the Ninja Museum

  A trick house of ninja craft and one of Japan's tallest castle walls, inside one park.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★

  Iwashimizu Hachimangu — The hilltop guardian shrine south of Kyoto

  A full imperial shrine on its own wooded hill, an easy ride south of the Kyoto crowds.

• 

  History Kumamoto ★★

  Kamishikimi Kumanoimasu Shrine

  A lantern-lined cedar climb ending at a rock with a hole punched through it.

• 

  Nature Hyogo ★★

  Koko-en Garden

  Nine walled gardens on excavated foundations, with a gate of their own.

• 

  Food Kumamoto ★★

  Kumamoto Akaushi — Japanese Brown beef raised on the Aso grasslands

  Aso's lean red wagyu, sold a minute from the station platform.

• 

  Food Kumamoto ★★

  Kumamoto Ramen

  Kumamoto's own tonkotsu, several counters of it, inside the station you arrive at.

• 

  History Mie ★★

  Kumano Kodo Iseji Magose Pass

  The Iseji's best-kept stone paving, shaded the whole way up.

• 

  Culture Kyoto ★★

  Kyoto Station Building

  A free rooftop route through the city's front door, best before the shops open.

• 

  History Kumamoto ★★

  Manda Pit of Miike Coal Mine

  A Meiji pit head you walk into, machinery, lockers and lamp room included.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★

  Mimuroto-ji — Uji's hillside temple of seasonal flowers

  A hillside garden that flowers in sequence, under a pilgrimage hall on the terrace above.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★

  Myoshin-ji — Head temple of a walled town of Zen sub-temples

  A Zen temple town: a dragon ceiling, halls in a line, lanes between walls.

• 

  Entertainment Mie ★★

  Nagashima Spa Land — an amusement park built on a hot-spring island

  The country's headline coaster park, with an onsen and an outlet mall on the same island.

• 

  Nature Mie ★★

  Onigajo and Shishiiwa — Wave-cut sea caves and a lion-shaped rock in southern Mie

  Sea caves you can walk into, and a lion-shaped rock down the same coast.

• 

  History Miyagi ★★

  Osaki Hachimangu — Date Masamune's national-treasure shrine in Sendai

  Japan's oldest gongen-zukuri hall, black lacquer and gold, free to walk up to.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★

  Shugakuin Imperial Villa

  A free imperial garden that borrows a whole mountain — booked, not queued.

• 

  Entertainment Mie ★★

  Suzuka Circuit

  A Formula 1 circuit you can simply walk into on a day with no race.

• 

  Food Kumamoto ★★

  Taipien — Kumamoto's Chinese-style glass noodle soup

  Kumamoto's own noodle bowl, on the arcade where the old Chinese kitchens are.

• 

  History Kyoto ★★

  Takao Sanbi Temples — Three temple valleys northwest of Kyoto

  Three valley temples on one bus line — a stone stair, a river, and a World Heritage hall.

• 

  History Miyagi ★★

  Zuihoden — Sendai's Momoyama-style clan mausoleum

  Masamune's grave under the cedars, rebuilt exactly as it burned.

• 

  Onsen Nagano ★★

  Bessho Onsen — Bath village among the temples of the Shioda Plain

  Public baths open at first light, with the Shioda Plain's great temples on the same lane.

• 

  History Nagasaki ★★

  Goto Islands

  Nagasaki's church islands, entered through one terminal that also holds the boats onward.

• 

  Craft Nagasaki ★★

  Hasami Porcelain Town

  A whole porcelain district in one day — rebuilt kilns below, working ones up the valley.

• 

  Food Miyagi ★★

  Kesennuma Shark Fin

  Japan's shark port, with the fin trade at street level.

• 

  Nature Miyazaki ★★

  Kunimigaoka — Takachiho's cloud-sea lookout

  Autumn dawns here sink the whole basin under cloud.

• 

  History Nagasaki ★★

  Meganebashi Bridge — Japan's oldest twin-arch stone bridge

  The first arched stone bridge in Japan, free and open on a city river.

• 

  Food Miyagi ★★

  Miyagi Oysters

  Look down on the bay that grows the seed, then eat what it grows.

• 

  Craft Miyagi ★★

  Miyagi Traditional Kokeshi — Wooden dolls from the hot-spring valleys

  Five recognised lineages of turned doll, gathered in one hall above the hot springs.

• 

  History Miyazaki ★★

  Miyazaki Jingu — Shrine to the legendary first emperor of Japan

  A whole wood kept inside a city, at the end of a gravel avenue.

• 

  Nature Nagasaki ★★

  Nita Pass — The lower station of the Unzen Ropeway

  A short cable car onto the ridge, with a young lava dome facing you.

• 

  Nature Nagano ★★

  Norikura Kogen — Plateau under the Northern Alps

  Alpine scenery reached by public bus, with waterfall trails at the base.

• 

  Onsen Nagano ★★

  Nozawa Onsen — A hot-spring village in the snow country of north Nagano

  Thirteen free bathhouses kept by the villagers, and a boiling spring kitchen above them.

• 

  History Miyazaki ★★

  Saitobaru Burial Mounds

  An open plateau of ancient tombs — no gate, no ticket, no closing time.

• 

  Nature Nagano ★★

  Shiga Kogen — A highland of ponds and ski runs in a national park

  A national-park highland where one bus ride reaches both the ponds and the lifts.

• 

  History Nagasaki ★★

  Shimabara Castle

  Edo-period walls and moat under a rebuilt keep — the outside is the older half.

• 

  History Miyagi ★★

  Shiwahiko and Shiogama Shrines

  Two shrines, two centuries, one hilltop — and the front steps are the proper way in.

• 

  Onsen Nagano ★★

  Shirahone Onsen — Milk-white sulphur water in a limestone gorge

  Milk-white sulphur water deep in a gorge, with one bath open to day visitors.

• 

  History Miyagi ★★

  Shiroishi Castle

  A wooden turret rebuilt by traditional carpentry — the frame is what you came for.

• 

  Entertainment Miyazaki ★★

  Sun Messe Nichinan — A clifftop park on the Nichinan coast

  The only moai reproduction Rapa Nui ever licensed, standing over open Pacific.

• 

  Culture Miyazaki ★★

  Takachiho Shrine

  Kagura danced every night of the year, in the head shrine of the district.

• 

  Nature Nagasaki ★★

  Tsushima Island

  The island where Japan ends — rias bays, sea torii, and a view to Busan.

• 

  History Nagano ★★

  Ueda Castle Ruins Park — The Sanada clan's stronghold in eastern Nagano

  The Sanada fort's real defence was the cliff, and the park is open at any hour.

• 

  Nature Miyazaki ★★

  Cape Hyuga and Umagase

  A national natural monument of columnar rock, read from a glass deck at the edge.

• 

  Culture Niigata ★★

  Echigo-Tsumari Art Field — Outdoor art around the Matsudai rice terraces

  A famous art region with a section you can walk straight off the train.

• 

  Onsen Niigata ★★

  Echigo-Yuzawa Onsen

  A spa street, a novel and public baths, all at a Shinkansen stop.

• 

  Food Mie ★★

  Ise Udon

  A soft, dark-sauced udon you can only really meet on the Ise approach.

• 

  Culture Nara ★★

  Isuien Garden

  A walled garden that makes Todaiji's gate and Wakakusayama part of its own picture.

• 

  Local life Kanagawa ★★

  Komachi-dori — Kamakura's shopping and eating street

  The one street everyone in Kamakura walks, with a way to walk it well.

• 

  Food Nara ★★

  Narazuke — Sake-lees pickles from the old capital

  Nara's oldest thing to take home, sold a short walk from the platform.

• 

  Food Nagano ★★

  Nozawana Pickles

  Nagano's winter pickle, at the roadside station of the village it is named after.

• 

  Food Nagasaki ★★

  Sasebo Burger — The navy port town's made-to-order hamburger

  A local burger with a published list of who may make it.

• 

  Nature Nara ★★

  Soni Kogen — Nara's silver-grass highland

  A whole basin of silver grass, with lanterns lit around the marsh after dark.

• 

  Local life Nara ★★

  Tanize Suspension Bridge

  Still the longest of Japan's suspension bridges built for daily village life.

• 

  Culture Akita ★★

  Akita Museum of Art

  Foujita's portrait of Akita, then coffee by the water garden.

• 

  Culture Akita ★★

  Hanawa Bayashi — Ten gilded floats and festival music through the night

  Ten gilded floats, one station plaza, and festival music until the small hours.

• 

  History Akita ★★

  Isedotai Site — Four Jomon stone circles side by side

  Four Jomon stone circles side by side — found nowhere else in Japan.

• 

  Culture Akita ★★

  Kakunodate Festival — Doll-topped floats hauled through a castle town

  Doll-topped floats, street negotiations, and a push when talks fail.

• 

  Craft Akita ★★

  Kawatsura Lacquerware

  A lacquer district's own hall, with today's pieces below and the trade's tools above.

• 

  Nature Akita ★★

  Kisakata Kujukushima — Pine-topped islets standing in rice paddies

  Islands left standing in rice paddies — walk between them from the temple gate.

• 

  Culture Aichi ★★

  Konomiya Hadaka Matsuri — Naked festival at the old head shrine of Owari

  One chosen man, a day of bamboo offerings, and a rite before dawn.

• 

  Nature Akita ★★

  Mount Moriyoshi Snow Monsters

  Ride a gondola into one of Japan's three great fields of snow monsters.

• 

  Culture Akita ★★

  Nishimonai Bon Odori — Three August nights of hooded dancers by firelight

  Hooded dancers by bonfire light on one small-town street, three nights each August.

• 

  Food Aichi ★★

  Nishio Matcha — A matcha town in Aichi, and a tea room from Kyoto

  Nishio matcha by the bowl, in a noble's house inside a free castle park.

• 

  Culture Akita ★★

  Omagari Fireworks

  Japan's national fireworks contest, where makers fire their own shells by day and by night.

• 

  Culture Aichi ★★

  Owari Tsushima Tenno Festival — Lantern boats by night, dressed boats by morning

  Lantern boats by night, leapers in the river by morning — see both halves.

• 

  Nature Akita ★★

  Oyasukyo Daifunto — Steam and boiling water bursting from a gorge wall

  Walk the floor of a gorge past a cliff roaring with 98°C steam.

• 

  Culture Aichi ★★

  Tezutsu Hanabi — Hand-held fireworks at Toyohashi's Yoshida Shrine

  Fireworks held in human arms, at the shrine said to have started them.

• 

  Culture Akita ★★

  Tsuchizaki Minato Hikiyama Festival

  Warrior floats through a port town in July, and a real one indoors the rest of the year.

• 

  Onsen Aomori ★★

  Asamushi Onsen — Aomori City's seaside spa town on Mutsu Bay

  Aomori's seaside spa town: a footbath, an island view and an aquarium, one train from the city.

• 

  History Chiba ★★

  Awa Shrine

  Old Awa's head shrine, with a cherry avenue and a goddess shrine cut into a sea-worn rock.

• 

  Food Chiba ★★

  Choshi Tsuri-Kinme — Line-caught kinmedai from the Choshi coast

  Hand-line kinme from Choshi, close to the market that auctions it.

• 

  Nature Aomori ★★

  Gono Line — Resort Shirakami along the Sea of Japan coast

  The Sea of Japan coast from a train that slows down for it.

• 

  Culture Aomori ★★

  Hachinohe Enburi — A midwinter dance that prays for the rice harvest

  The dance that calls in spring, followed from its first steps at the shrine.

• 

  Culture Aomori ★★

  Hachinohe Sansha Taisai — Three shrines' summer festival of giant floats

  Mechanised floats that open over the street — still on the eve, moving after.

• 

  Nature Chiba ★★

  Haraoka Pier

  A 1921 wooden fishing pier running straight into Tomiura Bay, with Fuji on clear days.

• 

  Culture Aomori ★★

  Hirosaki Neputa Festival

  A week of painted fan lanterns, watched from a town-centre kerb.

• 

  Culture Aomori ★★

  Inakadate Rice Paddy Art

  The birthplace of rice paddy art, seen from the angle it was drawn for.

• 

  History Aomori ★★

  Iwakiyama Shrine

  The red gate and the trail to Tsugaru's sacred summit, in its biggest restoration in over a century.

• 

  Culture Akita ★★

  Kamihinokinai Paper Balloon Festival

  Hand-painted paper giants rising on firelight into a February night.

• 

  Culture Akita ★★

  Kariwano Great Tug-of-War

  A whole town pulling against itself on a February night — and anyone may grab the rope.

• 

  History Chiba ★★

  Kasamori Kannon — A hilltop Kannon hall on stilts on all four sides

  Japan's only temple hall stilted on all four sides, set on a boulder in Chiba's hills.

• 

  Nature Ehime ★★

  Kirosan Observatory Park

  The Kurushima-Kaikyo Bridge from directly above, from a deck hidden in the hill.

• 

  Nature Ehime ★★

  Nametoko Gorge

  A clear stream sliding over bare granite, with one of Japan's Top 100 Waterfalls.

• 

  History Chiba ★★

  Niemonjima — Chiba's largest island, reached by hand-rowed boat

  Chiba's largest island, crossed by hand-rowed boat, with a Yoritomo legend cave.

• 

  History Chiba ★★

  Nojimazaki Lighthouse

  The tip of the Boso Peninsula, seen from the top of a lighthouse you can climb.

• 

  Culture Chiba ★★

  Ohara Hadaka Matsuri — Isumi's autumn festival of mikoshi in the surf

  Mikoshi in the Pacific surf by day, a sung farewell under fireworks by night.

• 

  Nature Aomori ★★

  Cape Shiriyazaki — Lighthouse and grazing horses at Honshu's north-east tip

  Japan's tallest brick lighthouse, with horses grazing at its foot.

• 

  Nature Chiba ★★

  Tainoura — Wild sea bream that rise to a boat off Kominato

  Wild sea bream rising to the boat in a protected bay.

• 

  Culture Aomori ★★

  Takayama Inari Shrine

  Red torii twisting like a dragon through a pond garden in western Tsugaru.

• 

  History Chiba ★★

  Tamasaki Shrine

  Black-lacquered halls, and a festival that carries the gods down to the sea.

• 

  Culture Aomori ★★

  Tsugaru Shamisen — Live sets in Kanagi, the music's birthplace

  Five live Tsugaru shamisen sets a day, in the founder's home town.

• 

  Culture Chiba ★★

  Tsurigasaki Beach

  The beach where surfing made its Olympic debut, with a torii on the sand.

• 

  Onsen Fukui ★★

  Awara Onsen

  A free cypress foot bath and a short temple loop, right by the local train.

• 

  History Ehime ★★

  Botchan Train

  A Meiji-style train on the city tram tracks, plus a free museum for the days it rests.

• 

  Craft Fukui ★★

  Echizen Pottery Village

  Echizen ware's home ground: a museum, clay classes and a free sculpture park in one walk.

• 

  Craft Fukui ★★

  Echizen Lacquerware — The lacquer makers' hall in Sabae

  Watch lacquer worked by hand, then choose a bowl from the makers' own shop.

• 

  Food Fukui ★★

  Hamayaki Saba — Obama's whole mackerel, skewered and grilled

  Whole skewered mackerel, in the town where the road to Kyoto began.

• 

  History Fukuoka ★★

  Homangu Kamado Shrine

  A good-match shrine below, with a mountaintop shrine to climb to above.

• 

  History Fukui ★★

  Imajo-juku — Snow-country post town on the old Hokuriku road

  A snow-country post town whose station doubles as its history hall.

• 

  Nature Fukui ★★

  Kehi no Matsubara — Pine grove on the shore of Tsuruga Bay

  One of Japan's three great pine groves, a short bus ride from Tsuruga Station.

• 

  History Fukui ★★

  Myotsuji Temple

  Fukui's only National Treasure buildings: a Kamakura hall and pagoda in one visit.

• 

  Culture Ehime ★★

  Niihama Taiko Festival — Giant embroidered floats lifted by hand each October

  Gold-embroidered floats raised overhead by hand, and a real one by the station most of the year.

• 

  History Ehime ★★

  Noshima Castle Ruins

  A whole island once built as a castle, seen from a boat in racing tides.

• 

  History Fukui ★★

  Obama Nishigumi — Old teahouse lane and merchant houses in Obama

  A red-lattice teahouse lane, walkable from Obama Station.

• 

  Culture Ehime ★★

  Saijo Festival

  Lantern-lit floats line a riverbank to see a shrine home at dusk.

• 

  Nature Fukui ★★

  Sotomo — Granite sea caves and cliffs on the Uchitomi Peninsula

  Granite caves and arches on the Wakasa coast, on an hour-long boat from Obama.

• 

  History Ehime ★★

  Taisanji Temple

  A National Treasure hall at the top of a three-gate pilgrim climb.

• 

  History Fukui ★★

  Tsuruga Red Brick Warehouse — A Meiji oil depot on the old port

  A Meiji oil depot, with the old port rebuilt in miniature inside.

• 

  Culture Ehime ★★

  Uwajima Bullfighting — Bull-against-bull bouts in a domed hilltop ring

  One of Japan's few bull-against-bull traditions, in a domed ring above Uwajima.

• 

  Culture Ehime ★★

  Uwajima Ushioni Festival — Uwajima's summer festival of ox-demon floats

  Demon-faced ox floats by day, a torchlit river charge by night.

• 

  Craft Fukui ★★

  Wakasa Agate Craft — The craft workshop in Obama's food culture museum

  Polish a piece of fire-reddened agate with your own hands.

• 

  Food Fukui ★★

  Wakasa Fugu — Tiger puffer farmed in the sea off Fukui

  Japan's northernmost farmed tiger puffer, met at the harbour market in the town where it began.

• 

  History Fukui ★★

  Wakasahiko and Wakasahime Shrines — The paired first-rank shrines of old Wakasa

  Wakasa's first-rank pair of shrines, with a 40m cedar behind the lower one's gates.

• 

  Local life Kyoto ★

  Wazuka Ishitera Tea Fields

  Kyoto's first protected landscape: 800-year-old tea terraces, a free lookout, off-route.

• 

  Nature Tokyo ★

  Hatonosu Gorge

  An emerald gorge and footbridge minutes from the station — an easy half-day from Tokyo.

• 

  History Saitama ★

  Banba-dori — Chichibu's stone-paved shrine approach

  A protected pre-war shopping street on a shrine approach, direct by train from Ikebukuro.

• 

  Nature Kyoto ★

  Kiyotaki — the river gorge below Mt. Atago

  A cool riverside gorge and a working pilgrimage trailhead, one short bus ride past Arashiyama.

• 

  History Kyoto ★

  Saga-Toriimoto — the pilgrimage lane above Arashiyama

  A protected 600 m street of thatched farmhouses, past where Arashiyama's crowds stop.

• 

  Craft Kyoto ★

  Otagi Nenbutsu-ji — the temple of 1,200 hand-carved rakan

  1,200 hand-carved stone figures, each with its own face — quiet, and easy from Arashiyama.

• 

  Nature Kyoto ★

  Yase & the Takano River

  A cool, clear river below Mt. Hiei, about 40 min from Kyoto by frequent train.

• 

  Nature Kyoto ★

  Kifune Shrine Okumiya

  The water god's original shrine, a quiet 15-min walk past the crowds up the same valley.

• 

  History Kyoto ★

  Mount Kasagi & Kasagi-dera

  A rock-carved Buddha, a 1331 battle site and a real boulder climb near Kyoto.

• 

  History Kyoto ★

  Shoju-in — the heart-window temple in the tea hills

  A heart-shaped window and a 160-panel flower ceiling, out in Kyoto's quiet tea hills.

• 

  History Kyoto ★

  Tono Stone Buddha Walk

  A calm 2 km temple-to-temple walk past medieval rock-carved Buddhas, easy on the feet.

• 

  Craft Kyoto ★

  Nagatani Soen's Birthplace — where sencha was born in 1738

  The documented birthplace of modern Japanese sencha, in a quiet working tea valley.

• 

  History Kyoto ★

  Eshin-in — the free flower garden beside Byodoin

  A free flower garden by the river, a few minutes from famous Byodoin but almost empty.

• 

  Nature Kyoto ★

  Dosenbo — the tea-and-paddy plateau in Yamashiro

  Kyoto's only village: a silent 500 m plateau of tea fields, paddies and cool air.

• 

  History Kyoto ★

  Kisaichi Maruyama Kofun — Kyoto's largest round burial mound

  The largest round burial mound in Kyoto Prefecture, fully rebuilt on a quiet hill — reachable from Kyoto by limited express.

• 

  History Kyoto ★

  Komyo-ji's Niomon — a National Treasure gate above Ayabe

  Northern Kyoto's only National Treasure: a rare 13th-century two-storey temple gate.

• 

  Nature Kyoto ★

  Ohno Dam's Rainbow Lake

  A free lakeside park of 1,000 cherry and 500 maple trees, near Miyama's thatched village.

• 

  Local life Kyoto ★

  Mizuo — Kyoto's yuzu village above the Hozu gorge

  Kyoto's quiet yuzu-citrus village, reached by a tiny village bus from a gorge station.

• 

  Nature Kyoto ★

  Rurikei Gorge

  A cool 4 km gorge of clear pools and named falls, far quieter than Kyoto's famous valleys.

• 

  Nature Kyoto ★

  Kami-Seya — thatched village and rice terraces above Amanohashidate

  One of Japan's 100 chosen villages: 207 terraced paddies still farmed, few visitors.

• 

  Craft Kyoto ★

  Chirimen Kaido — the Tango-silk merchant street of Kaya

  A whole silk-merchant town kept as a preservation district, far quieter than Kyoto city.

• 

  Nature Osaka ★

  Minoh River Dam & Visitor Center

  A quiet forest dam and free visitor center a short walk above the famous Minoh Falls.

• 

  Nature Osaka ★

  Hoshi-no-Buranko — a 280-metre forest suspension bridge

  A 280m forest suspension bridge, an hour's walk from the station and almost crowd-free.

• 

  Nature Osaka ★

  Settsu Gorge & Shirataki Falls

  A cool 4 km river-gorge walk to a waterfall, a short bus ride from Takatsuki.

• 

  Local life Osaka ★

  Miyama-no-Sato & Ryusenkyo Gorge — a farm stand in the Osaka hills

  A working farm stand and quiet gorge waterfall in the Osaka hills, off the tourist map.

• 

  History Osaka ★

  Minase Jingu — shrine on a retired emperor's palace site

  Free, calm imperial shrine with Osaka's only Top-100 spring, 10-min walk from the station.

• 

  History Osaka ★

  Mt. Tennozan

  A nation-turning 1582 battlefield, a short steep climb from a station 15 min from Kyoto.

• 

  History Osaka ★

  Inoue Sekiemon Residence — Japan's only surviving Edo gunsmith workshop-home

  Japan's only surviving Edo-period gunsmith workshop-and-home, an easy trip from Osaka.

• 

  History Osaka ★

  Tondabayashi Jinaimachi — Osaka's only preserved Edo temple town

  Osaka Prefecture's only preserved Edo townscape, a short train ride from central Osaka.

• 

  History Osaka ★

  Kanshin-ji — the mountain temple of Kusunoki Masashige

  A quiet National-Treasure temple most travelers skip on the way to Mt. Koya.

• 

  Nature Osaka ★

  Ushitaki Gorge & Daiitoku-ji

  A maple-and-waterfall gorge with a mountain temple and a vermilion 1515 pagoda near Kishiwada.

• 

  History Osaka ★

  Kuzunoha Inari Shrine

  The fox-mother legend of Kyoto's famous diviner, at a calm shrine 5 min from the station.

• 

  Nature Osaka ★

  Takihata 48 Waterfalls

  A cool, green waterfall gorge an hour from central Osaka, still quiet on weekdays.

• 

  Craft Shiga ★

  Sakamoto — Anō-shū stone-wall lanes below Mt. Hiei

  Whole lanes walled in mortar-free stone by a famous mason guild — a town most people skip.

• 

  Nature Shiga ★

  Ōmi-Maiko — the reed-fringed lagoon behind the pine beach

  A short train ride from Kyoto to a still, reed-lined lagoon behind the busy pine beach.

• 

  Nature Shiga ★

  Yōbai Falls

  Shiga's tallest waterfall — an easy train ride from Kyoto, then a quiet uphill walk.

• 

  Local life Shiga ★

  Katata & Ukimido — the lake-clan port on Lake Biwa

  The famous floating hall, plus the quiet old port town of the lake clans right behind it.

• 

  Craft Shiga ★

  Shigaraki Kiln Walk

  A self-guided 2 km path through a pottery town, past old kilns now turned into shops and cafes.

• 

  History Shiga ★

  Rakuyaji — temple of Japan's largest seated Kannon

  Japan's largest seated Eleven-Headed Kannon, in a quiet rural temple, rarely crowded.

• 

  Nature Shiga ★

  Nishino-ko reed channels

  A slow, engine-free reed-marsh boat ride on a heritage lake, a short bus hop from the station.

• 

  History Shiga ★

  Gokasho Kondo — the Omi merchants' white-walled home town

  A national preservation district of Omi-merchant houses and koi-filled canals, well off the tourist trail.

• 

  Local life Shiga ★

  Kawaramachi-Serimachi — Hikone's Edo-era merchant back-lanes

  A living Edo-era merchant street by Hikone Castle, with cafes inside preserved townhouses.

• 

  Food Shiga ★

  Taga Taisha's Ema-dori Approach — where shops still cut mochi with thread

  A quiet shrine approach where shops still cut mochi with thread, easy to reach from Maibara by local railway.

• 

  Local life Shiga ★

  Yu-ichiban-gai — Nagahama's retro arcade and its kaleidoscope

  A free 8-meter kaleidoscope on a calm retro arcade, one street off the busy glass district.

• 

  History Hyogo ★

  Aotanido — the stone pilgrim path up Mt. Maya

  A quiet historic stone stairway up Mt. Maya, beside the cablecar most people ride.

• 

  Nature Hyogo ★

  Nakayama-dera Oku-no-in — the pilgrim path to the inner sanctuary

  A quiet 2 km pilgrim climb near Osaka, ending at a spring day-trippers skip.

• 

  Food Hyogo ★

  Moushi — the highland tea hamlet of northern Sanda

  A working highland tea village few visitors reach, with its own named tea, Moushi-cha.

• 

  History Hyogo ★

  Kawaramachi Tsumairi Merchant Row

  A protected Edo merchant street kept quiet because day-trippers stop at the castle nearby.

• 

  Craft Hyogo ★

  Mikage-go — walkable sake-brewery streets of Nada

  Japan's densest sake district, walked as quiet lanes, with a free old-brewery museum

• 

  Nature Nara ★

  Tsukigase Plum Grove

  10,000 plum trees in a river gorge — an old dye-crop grove, quiet off-bloom.

• 

  Nature Nara ★

  Matabei-zakura — a lone 300-year weeping cherry

  One 300-year weeping cherry standing alone on a samurai family's old estate, framed by peach blossoms.

• 

  Local life Nara ★

  Inabuchi Rice Terraces & Scarecrow Road

  A living Top-100 rice-terrace valley, lined with handmade scarecrows each autumn.

• 

  Nature Nara ★

  Miyataki — the ancient emperors' Yoshino River gorge

  A 7th-century imperial palace site, now a quiet boulder-and-pool river gorge.

• 

  History Nara ★

  Hokiji Temple

  Japan's oldest three-story pagoda (706), above a quiet Nara field of October cosmos.

• 

  History Nara ★

  Uda-Matsuyama — the medicine merchant town of Nara

  A nationally listed Edo herb-merchant town, an hour from Osaka, that tourists skip.

• 

  History Wakayama ★

  Miyama Battery Ruins

  The overgrown-fortress feel of famous Tomogashima, but on the mainland and ferry-free.

• 

  History Wakayama ★

  Awashima Shrine

  A rare seaside doll shrine — thousands of offered dolls, off the usual tourist route.

• 

  Nature Wakayama ★

  Jogasaki Coast

  A quiet tide-revealed rock shelf with an open sea view — a calm alternative to a beach.

• 

  History Wakayama ★

  Choishi-michi — the old pilgrim road to Koyasan

  Start the world-heritage pilgrim road at its true foot: a quiet riverside temple.

• 

  History Wakayama ★

  Kimiidera — 231 steps up to a bay-view temple

  A famous bay-view temple that is quiet and near-empty right at its 8:00 opening.

• 

  Nature Tokyo ★

  Hossawa Falls

  Tokyo's only Top-100 waterfall, four calm tiers reached on foot past a village tofu shop.

• 

  Nature Tokyo ★

  Shiromaru Dam Fish Ladder — a 330-metre tunnel you can walk inside

  One of Japan's longest fish ladders, free to walk inside, with a spiral-stair descent underground.

• 

  Nature Tokyo ★

  Kanotoiwa — the chain-and-ladder rock gorge

  Edge along a rock face on fixed chains through a quiet Tokyo natural-monument gorge.

• 

  Onsen Tokyo ★

  Tsurutsuru Onsen

  Silky pH 10.1 alkaline water and an open-air cypress tub, a day trip from Tokyo.

• 

  Culture Tokyo ★

  Gyokudo Art Museum

  A quiet painter's museum and dry garden above a river gorge, short walk from the station.

• 

  Food Tokyo ★

  Sawanoi — a 300-year-old riverside sake brewery

  Tokyo's oldest sake brewery, with a riverside garden for tasting by the water.

• 

  Local life Tokyo ★

  Yagiri no Watashi — Tokyo's last river ferry

  Tokyo's only surviving hand-poled river ferry, past the Shibamata temple crowds.

• 

  History Tokyo ★

  Hebimichi — a buried river made into a lane

  A quiet 150m lane that bends 15 times because it traces a river buried in 1921.

• 

  Local life Tokyo ★

  Hyogo Yokocho — a stone-paved old geisha-quarter alley

  A film-set-quiet stone alley of old geisha-quarter Tokyo, 5 min from Iidabashi Stn.

• 

  Nature Tokyo ★

  Todoroki Ravine

  The only ravine inside central Tokyo, three minutes from the train and free to walk.

• 

  History Tokyo ★

  Fukagawa Fudo-do — where a fire rite is held daily

  A real daily fire rite in central Tokyo, free to attend, with coffee roasters next door.

• 

  Nature Saitama ★

  Hashidate Limestone Cave

  Saitama's only show cave, and a rare vertical-shaft one you climb straight up.

• 

  History Saitama ★

  Mt. Myohogatake

  A ~90-min chained ridge to Mitsumine Shrine's quiet summit inner shrine (~1,329 m).

• 

  Nature Saitama ★

  Bishamon-sui — a free spring from a limestone mountain

  One of Japan's '100 Famous Waters' — a limestone spring you can still fill for free.

• 

  History Saitama ★

  Wadō Ruins

  The real hillside where copper for Japan's first coin was mined in 708 — quiet, uncrowded.

• 

  Nature Saitama ★

  Mt. Minoyama

  A rare lone peak with an all-around basin view, and a dawn sea of clouds in season.

• 

  Nature Saitama ★

  Urayama Dam & Chichibu Sakura Lake

  Japan's 2nd-tallest gravity dam, with a free elevator inside and a walk across the top.

• 

  Craft Saitama ★

  Ogawa Washi Learning Center — where you make UNESCO-listed paper

  Hand-dip your own UNESCO-listed washi sheet, one hour from Tokyo, at a town-run center.

• 

  Nature Saitama ★

  Mt. Tenran

  A 197m hill near Tokyo: a half-hour climb to a plain-and-Fuji view, rarely crowded.

• 

  History Saitama ★

  Hachigata Castle Ruins

  A real, un-rebuilt castle ruin above a quiet scenic riverbank, by train from Ikebukuro.

• 

  Nature Saitama ★

  Ouchizawa Hanamomo no Sato — a hillside of flowering peach trees

  A Saitama mountain slope of ~5,000 flowering peach trees, rose and white in early spring.

• 

  Nature Kanagawa ★

  Umanose-domon — a wave-carved sea arch

  A dramatic natural sea arch with an open-ocean view, on a quiet island shore an easy day trip from Tokyo.

• 

  Nature Kanagawa ★

  Tsurugisaki Lighthouse

  One of Japan's oldest Western-style lighthouses, on a quiet cape near Tokyo.

• 

  Local life Kanagawa ★

  Shinnase Beach

  A clear-day lineup of a sea torii, a lighthouse, and Mount Fuji, an easy trip from Tokyo.

• 

  Nature Kanagawa ★

  Ena Bay Tidal Flat

  A living natural mudflat near Tokyo, rich in crabs and birds, one minute from the bus stop.

• 

  History Kanagawa ★

  Goryo Shrine

  Three real landmarks in one short walk, off the Great Buddha crowd, where the little Enoden train slides past a shrine gate.

• 

  Food Kanagawa ★

  Misaki Shitamachi — tuna-town streets behind the fishing port

  A retro tuna-town quarter of dye shops and diners, one street back from the busy market.

• 

  History Kanagawa ★

  Sasuke Inari Shrine

  A quiet fox shrine up a red-torii tunnel, minutes from famous Zeniarai Benten.

• 

  History Kanagawa ★

  Toshoji Ruins & Harakiri Yagura

  The quiet spot where the Kamakura shogunate fell in 1333 — a sober National Historic Site.

• 

  Nature Kanagawa ★

  Mitsuishi — three rope-bound sacred rocks offshore

  Quiet shrine rocks with a famous New Year sunrise, two hours from Tokyo.

• 

  History Kanagawa ★

  Ishigakiyama Ichiya Castle

  The 1590 siege headquarters as raw stone ruins in the hills, free and near Odawara Castle.

• 

  History Kanagawa ★

  Amidaji — Hakone's hydrangea temple

  Thousands of hydrangeas on a quiet temple stair, a short train hop from Hakone-Yumoto

• 

  Nature Kanagawa ★

  Soga Bairin — a plum grove under Mount Fuji

  35,000 plum trees flower under a clear Mount Fuji view, on a quiet farm line most visitors miss.

• 

  History Chiba ★

  Sharikido — the stone-haulers' trail up Mt. Nokogiri

  A real stone-cutters' route with cart ruts and sheer quarry walls, walkable from the station and free.

• 

  Nature Chiba ★

  Oyama Senmaida — rain-fed rice terraces near Tokyo

  The rain-fed rice terraces closest to Tokyo, mirror-flat and quiet on a spring morning.

• 

  Nature Chiba ★

  Ezuki Narcissus Road

  A 3 km winter lane of wild narcissus you smell before you see, walkable from a small station.

• 

  Nature Chiba ★

  Okinoshima — the walk-to island at Tateyama's tip

  A walk-to uninhabited island with northern coral, quiet once you pass the swimming beach.

• 

  History Chiba ★

  Torozaka Daishi Tunnel

  A quiet 10m hand-dug rock tunnel few visitors reach — dramatic light, no crowds.

• 

  History Chiba ★

  Gake Kannon — a vermilion hall in a sea cliff

  A red cliff-hall over Tateyama Bay, free, a 15-min walk from a station most people skip

• 

  History Chiba ★

  Iinawa-ji — the Tengu Temple of Isumi

  Wave carvings a local scholar ties to Hokusai's Great Wave, in a quiet temple

• 

  Craft Chiba ★

  Iwase Shuzo — a sake brewery with galleon-timber beams

  A 300-year-old working sake brewery in a thatched house tied to a 1609 Spanish shipwreck.

• 

  History Chiba ★

  Hiyodori-zaka — the samurai's bamboo slope in Sakura

  A quiet, unchanged bamboo lane by a samurai street, under an hour from Tokyo Stn.

• 

  Nature Chiba ★

  Katozu Twelve Bridges — a sappa-boat glide through Yoda-ura's canals

  A quiet poled-boat ride through canals and paddies, away from the town-centre crowds.

• 

  Nature Chiba ★

  Awamata Falls

  A rare sliding waterfall you walk up beside, an easy day trip from Tokyo into Chiba's quiet Yoro Valley.

• 

  Nature Chiba ★

  Taito Coastal Plant Colony

  One of Japan's first protected dune-plant colonies (1920), on a quiet shore.

• 

  History Yamanashi ★

  Mount Iwadono

  A short, steep climb to a castle-ruin peak with a clean Mt. Fuji view, west of Tokyo

• 

  Nature Yamanashi ★

  Tokaichiba-Natsugari Springs & Taro-Jiro Falls

  One of Japan's 100 Famous Waters: cold 12°C springs and twin cliff falls, near the train.

• 

  Local life Yamanashi ★

  Roadside Station Doshi

  Watercress at the source of Yokohama's water, with the clear river behind the station.

• 

  Onsen Yamanashi ★

  Akiyama Onsen

  A silky pH 9.8 alkaline day bath plus a walk through working rice terraces near Tokyo.

• 

  History Yamanashi ★

  Saruhashi Bridge

  A pierless cantilever bridge you can view from both the deck and the gorge path below.

• 

  Craft Yamanashi ★

  Yatsuzawa Aqueduct

  A century-old working aqueduct you can see for free, right beside the famous Saruhashi bridge.

• 

  Food Hyogo ★

  Uonotana — Akashi's fish-market arcade

  A working local fish market with Akashi's egg-and-octopus dumplings, 5 min from the station.

• 

  Food Nara ★

  Miwa — the Omiwa Shrine gate and somen's birthplace

  One of Japan's oldest shrines and the 1,300-year birthplace of hand-stretched somen.

• 

  Food Wakayama ★

  Wakayama chuka soba — the honor-system ramen counter

  A whole regional ramen culture — two broth styles and a table honor system — in one city.

• 

  Food Chiba ★

  Katsuura Tantanmen — Chiba's chili-oil ramen made for fishermen

  A soy-and-chili-oil ramen a fishing town made its own, served at ~40 certified shops.

• 

  Food Tokyo ★

  Jindaiji Soba — Chofu's temple-gate street of handmade noodles

  About 20 handmade-soba shops around a 733 temple, ~30 min from Shinjuku.

• 

  Onsen Kyoto ★

  Yunohana Onsen

  A quiet radium onsen valley 40 minutes from Kyoto, with almost no tourist crowds.

• 

  Onsen Osaka ★

  Inunakiyama Onsen

  Osaka's only hot-spring valley, wrapped around a 1,300-year Shugendo temple and its falls.

• 

  Onsen Tokyo ★

  Iwakura Onsen

  Tokyo's only onsen village — a quiet 1,200-year-old spring kept by one old inn

• 

  Onsen Saitama ★

  Otaki Onsen Yuyukan

  A city-run public bath under 1,000 yen with an open-air rock bath, at the end of the line.

• 

  Onsen Chiba ★

  Yoro Valley's black water — a coffee-dark onsen in central Chiba

  A truly coffee-dark hot spring, reached by a slow scenic local train.

• 

  Nature Tochigi ★

  Kegon Falls

  One of Japan's three great waterfalls — ride the elevator 100 m through the rock and meet it at plunge-pool level.

• 

  Nature Ibaraki ★

  Fukuroda Falls

  One of Japan's three great waterfalls: 120 m falling in four tiers, viewed from inside the cliff — and a wall of ice in January.

• 

  Nature Tochigi ★

  Lake Chuzenji

  A lake 1,269 m up that a volcano created — 25 km of shoreline, cruise boats, and the villas where Tokyo's diplomats escaped the summer.

• 

  Culture Tochigi ★

  Oya History Museum

  A 20,000 m² hall cut 30 metres under Utsunomiya by 70 years of quarrymen — 8°C year-round, and a film set ever since 1986.

• 

  Food Kanagawa ★

  The Cupnoodles Museum in Yokohama

  Invent-your-own-Cup-Noodle museum on the Yokohama waterfront; 500 yen entry, workshops extra.

• 

  History Kanagawa ★

  Meigetsuin — the hydrangea temple of Kita-Kamakura

  Kamakura's hydrangea temple and its round Window of Enlightenment — go at opening, not at noon.

• 

  History Kanagawa ★

  Zeniarai Benzaiten — the money-washing shrine of Kamakura

  Kamakura's money-washing cave shrine, entered through a rock tunnel — free, and best at 8:00.

• 

  Onsen Kanagawa ★

  Hakone-Yumoto — the gateway hot-spring town

  Hakone's oldest hot spring, 73 minutes direct from Shinjuku — worth stopping, not just changing trains.

• 

  Nature Wakayama ★

  Adventure World — Shirahama's safari park by the sea

  Wakayama's biggest animal park — safari, dolphin shows and a funfair on one ticket. The pandas left in June 2025.

• 

  History Wakayama ★

  Danjo Garan and Kongobuji — the ceremonial core of Mount Koya

  Kukai's original precinct on Mount Koya: a 48.5 m vermilion pagoda, the head temple, and Japan's largest rock garden.

• 

  History Kyoto ★

  Sannenzaka and Ninenzaka — Kyoto's stone-paved slopes to Kiyomizu

  Kyoto's most photographed lanes, protected by law since 1976 — and unrecognisably quiet before eight in the morning.

• 

  History Kanagawa ★

  Kawasaki Daishi — the temple that clears away misfortune

  A 900-year-old temple against misfortune, forty minutes from Tokyo Station — arrive at opening and the only sound is the candy-cutters warming up.

• 

  Culture Saitama ★

  The Railway Museum at Omiya

  Thirty-six real trains in one hall, a turntable that still turns a steam locomotive, and a D51 cab that shakes as you drive it.

• 

  Nature Chiba ★

  Kamogawa Sea World

  Orcas launching out of a pool whose far edge lines up with the Pacific horizon — two hours from Tokyo, and worth the whole day.

• 

  Local life Tokyo ★

  Ameyoko — Tokyo's postwar market street

  Four hundred shops under a railway viaduct, prices shouted out loud — the postwar black market that never stopped trading.

• 

  Onsen Tochigi ★

  Kinugawa Onsen — a hot-spring town in Nikko's river gorge

  Two hours from Asakusa with no transfer: a gorge lined with hot spring ryokan, and Nikko's shrines 30 minutes away.

• 

  Nature Tochigi ★

  The Nasu Highlands

  An active 1,915 m volcano with a ropeway, seventh-century hot springs, and farms and museums below — two hours from Tokyo by Shinkansen.

• 

  Nature Yamanashi ★

  Shosenkyo — the granite gorge above Kofu

  A 180 m granite pillar, a 30 m waterfall and a natural stone arch — Japan's top scenic designation, 50 minutes by bus from Kofu.

• 

  History Gunma ★

  Haruna Shrine

  Fifteen minutes uphill between rock walls and cedars to a hall built against a rock — a shrine founded in the 580s, an hour past Takasaki.

• 

  Nature Wakayama ★

  Hashigui-iwa — the bridge piers that walk into the sea

  Forty rock pillars marching out to sea — the bridge Kobo Daishi never got to finish.

• 

  Craft Tokyo ★

  Kappabashi Kitchen Town

  850 metres of nothing but the tools of food — where Japan's restaurants shop, ten minutes from Sensoji.

• 

  Nature Tokyo ★

  The Meguro River cherry tunnel

  Four kilometres of cherry closing over a canal — get there before seven, or don't bother.

• 

  History Kanagawa ★

  Hokokuji — the Kamakura temple with a bamboo garden

  Two thousand bamboo behind a Zen temple of 1334 — Kamakura's quiet side, and it opens at nine.

• 

  Onsen Gunma ★

  Ikaho Onsen's 365 stone steps — a hot-spring town built as one street

  365 stone steps — one for each day of the year — climbing through a hot-spring town laid out four centuries ago so one source could feed the whole street.

• 

  Onsen Gunma ★

  Shima Onsen — a cure-spring valley set apart in 1954

  In 1954 Japan named three hot springs as places to go and get well. Shima was one of them — and you can still drink the water.

• 

  History Ibaraki ★

  Kashima Jingu — the sword god's shrine

  Founded by tradition in 660 BC, head shrine to 600 others, wrapped in a forest of 800 plant species — the sword god's shrine is two hours from Tokyo Station.

• 

  History Kyoto ★

  Kitano Tenmangu — the shrine of Japan's god of learning

  The shrine that turned a disgraced minister into the god of learning — 1,500 plum trees, a National Treasure hall, and a thousand-year-old fair on the 25th.

• 

  Nature Kyoto ★

  Sagano Romantic Train — through the Hozu Gorge

  Ride an abandoned main line through the Hozu Gorge, then pole back down the same river by boat.

• 

  History Kyoto ★

  Chion-in — Japan's largest wooden temple gate

  Japan's largest wooden temple gate, free to walk under, fifteen minutes from Gion.

• 

  History Kyoto ★

  Kodai-ji — the temple Nene built for Hideyoshi

  Momoyama gold lacquer, a Kobori Enshu garden, and a widow's memorial to Hideyoshi — one lane off the Kiyomizu crowds.

• 

  History Osaka ★

  Tower of the Sun

  Okamoto Taro's 71-metre tower from the 1970 World Expo — and since 2018 you can go inside it.

• 

  Culture Kyoto ★

  Kyoto Railway Museum

  Fifty-four real trains, a 1914 roundhouse, and a live steam ride — ten minutes from Kyoto Station, 1,500 yen.

• 

  Entertainment Kyoto ★

  Uzumasa Kyoto Village — where samurai films are made

  Real film sets, not a replica village — Kyoto's period-drama backlot, rebuilt in 2026 as a park you walk into.

• 

  Nature Tokyo ★

  Rikugien — the Edo garden built from eighty-eight poems

  Eighty-eight poems built as hills and inlets, a famous weeping cherry, and 300 yen at the gate — Edo's other great garden.

• 

  Entertainment Tokyo ★

  Sanrio Puroland — Hello Kitty's indoor world in Tama

  Hello Kitty's own address: all indoors, weather-proof, 40 minutes from Shinjuku. Reserve before you go.

• 

  Food Tokyo ★

  Omoide Yokocho — Shinjuku's post-war grill alley

  Eighty tiny shops in two thousand square metres beside Shinjuku Station — the post-war alley the skyscrapers grew around.

• 

  Entertainment Tokyo ★

  Warner Bros. Studio Tour Tokyo — the Harry Potter sets you walk through

  The actual film sets — Great Hall, Diagon Alley, the Hogwarts Express — walked through on the old Toshimaen ground. Book online first; nothing is sold at the door.

• 

  Nature Kyoto ★

  Arashiyama Monkey Park Iwatayama

  A hundred and twenty wild macaques on a mountainside above Kyoto, twenty minutes uphill from the Togetsukyo bridge.

• 

  Nature Hyogo ★

  Kikuseidai on Mount Maya — one of Japan's three great night views

  Kobe's ten-million-dollar night view from an open terrace at 700 metres — bus, cablecar, ropeway, and the lights arrive in one band.

• 

  Nature Shiga ★

  Biwako Terrace — the whole lake seen from 1,100 m

  Japan's largest lake, seen whole from 1,100 m — five minutes of ropeway and the entire western shore is under you.

• 

  Food Kyoto ★

  Uji's matcha street

  160 metres of Uji tea, roasted at the roadside — the only street in Japan on a national list for how it smells.

• 

  Craft Kyoto ★

  Fushimi's sake quarter

  A 1637 brewery, a 1909 brewhouse, 400 city-designated tools and three glasses at the end — sake explained before it is poured.

• 

  History Fukui ★

  Ichijodani Asakura Clan Ruins

  A whole castle town excavated on a valley floor, walkable from the station in one visit.

• 

  Local life Niigata ★

  Izumozaki — A shogunal gold port lined with gable-front houses

  A town built one house wide, walked end to end in an afternoon.

• 

  Local life Toyama ★

  Kanayamachi Foundry Quarter

  Takaoka's oldest street, still doing the work it was built for.

• 

  History Fukui ★

  Kumagawa-juku — Post town on the mackerel road to Kyoto

  A mackerel-road post town with a water channel and a stone slab at every doorway.

• 

  Local life Fukui ★

  Mikuni Minato — Kitamae-bune port quarter in Sakai, Fukui

  Lattice-front merchant streets, a landmark former bank, and bicycles from a free visitor house.

• 

  Local life Miyazaki ★

  Aburatsu Horikawa Canal — A timber canal behind a working port

  A cedar-shipping canal that doubles as a harbour walk, ten minutes from the station.

• 

  History Kagoshima ★

  Iriki Fumoto Samurai District

  A quiet listed samurai quarter with a free Important Cultural Property at its centre.

• 

  History Miyazaki ★

  Mimitsu Historic Port Town — An Edo shipping port kept as a preservation district

  A national preservation district small enough to walk end to end in an hour.

• 

  Local life Yamagata ★

  Kaneyama Townscape — The cedar-and-plaster town in northern Yamagata

  A snow-country town that keeps building new houses to one agreed pattern.

• 

  History Tottori ★

  Chizu-juku — Post-town on the old Inaba highway, in cedar country

  A working highway town where the old road is still the main street.

• 

  Local life Tottori ★

  Itaibara Village — Japan's first prefecture-designated village district

  A working mountain hamlet, chosen for preservation before any other.

• 

  Local life Hiroshima ★

  Joge Shirakabe Townscape — A shogunate-run merchant town on the silver road

  A shogunate-era merchant street kept whole, minutes from a country platform.

• 

  Local life Okayama ★

  Kasaoka Islands — Bridgeless islands on the Seto Inland Sea

  Two islands on one boat line — a live quarry, then a fishing village.

• 

  History Hiroshima ★

  Mitarai Historic Port Town

  A working Edo harbour preserved whole, on an island the railway never reached.

• 

  History Tottori ★

  Wakasa-juku — Merchant post-town of white storehouses in the Tottori hills

  A post-town rebuilt in storehouses, still two streets deep at the end of a branch line.

• 

  History Kagawa ★

  Hiketa Historic Townscape

  A working soy-sauce street at the quiet eastern end of Kagawa.

• 

  Local life Tokushima ★

  Kamiyama — Tokushima's mountain town of fibre optics and artists

  A valley that rebuilt itself with cable and invitations, and can be walked in an afternoon.

• 

  Local life Ehime ★

  Ohanahan Street — Ozu's preserved Edo-era lane

  A castle-town lane where the Edo street plan is still legible.

• 

  History Tokushima ★

  Sadamitsu Two-Tiered Udatsu Street — Fire walls stacked in two tiers, on a street still in use

  Two-tiered udatsu are rare, and here they stand on a street still in use.

• 

  Nature Okinawa ★

  Aguni Island

  Cliffs, cycads and hand-made salt, on one boat a day.

• 

  Local life Okinawa ★

  Iheya Island — Okinawa's northernmost inhabited island

  A pine that grows sideways, on the last inhabited island going north.

• 

  Local life Okinawa ★

  Kuroshima Island

  Flat enough to cycle end to end, and handed over almost entirely to cattle.

• 

  Local life Nagasaki ★

  Shimabara Spring Water Town

  A garden pond, a carp lane and a samurai street in one flat walk.

• 

  History Nagano ★

  Unno-juku — A preserved Edo post town in Tomi

  One row of houses that changed trade instead of dying.

• 

  History Miyagi ★

  Kamitozawa and Shimotozawa — Two post towns on the old Shichikashuku Kaido

  Two post towns nobody restored, on a road that thirteen daimyo used.

• 

  History Miyagi ★

  Murata Storehouse Townscape

  A whole merchant street of kura and gates, free to walk.

• 

  Local life Yamaguchi ★

  Murotsu — Port village on the Kaminoseki strait

  A working port town with a Meiji folly beside its bus stop.

• 

  Local life Okinawa ★

  Oku Village — Northern Yanbaru settlement of tea and a co-op store

  See where Okinawa's community shops started.

• 

  History Yamaguchi ★

  Suo-Oshima Hawaii Migration Museum

  A Japanese island's Hawaiian half, kept in one house.

• 

  Local life Okinawa ★

  Tsuken Island — The carrot island off the Katsuren Peninsula

  An island where the crop is the landscape, a short boat ride off the main island.

• 

  Local life Okinawa ★

  Geruma Island — A bridge-linked island in the Kerama group

  A listed Ryukyuan house on an island the boats pass.

• 

  Local life Okinawa ★

  Ikei Island — Cane fields and beaches at the end of the causeway road

  A farming island at the end of the causeway road, with a rebuilt prehistoric village at its centre.

• 

  History Hokkaido ★

  Former Karikachi Line Museum

  A closed station where the night-train carriages left behind became the museum.

• 

  Food Chiba ★

  Kujukuri Sardines — Iwashi landed at the Katakai fishing port

  A free sardine museum, a fish counter and a working harbour, all in one building.

• 

  Food Chiba ★

  Nagareyama Shiro-Mirin — Birthplace of Japan's clear-style mirin

  The town that invented clear mirin, still one walkable street of brewers' warehouses.

• 

  Local life Akita ★

  Rokugo Springs — a town of named spring pools in inland Akita

  A whole town of named springs, walkable in an hour from one bus stop.

• 

  Local life Chiba ★

  Tokawa Old Fishing Town

  A working fishing town below the last timber station on the line.

• 

  Nature Chiba ★

  Yatsu-higata Tidal Flat

  A Ramsar wetland you reach on a commuter train, watched through glass.

• 

  Nature Chiba ★

  Meiji Centennial Observation Tower — A stacked concrete lookout at the tip of Cape Futtsu

  A concrete pine at the end of a sandspit, with Tokyo Bay on three sides from the top.

• 

  Nature Chiba ★

  Isumi Railway Rapeseed Fields

  A country line the neighbours turn yellow each spring, walkable even while the trains are out.

• 

  Nature Chiba ★

  Ubara Risokyo — A wooded headland walk on the Katsuura coast

  A 2,300-metre loop around a ria headland, five lookouts, and nothing to pay.

• 

  Food Chiba ★

  Yachimata Peanuts

  Japan's largest peanut harvest, in a plateau town cleared only in the Meiji era.

• 

  Local life Gunma ★

  Obata Castle Town — Kanra's samurai quarter along an Edo irrigation canal

  An Edo castle-town plan you can still walk: canal, samurai lane, daimyo garden, in that order.

• 

  Local life Ehime ★

  Saijo Uchinuki — Free-flowing artesian springs in a water town

  Water that arrives without a pump, in a town built on top of it.

• 

  Food Gunma ★

  Shimonita Konjac — Gunma's konjac town and its roadside market

  Japan's konjac heartland, met at its roadside produce hall.