We start close to home: the prefectures around Tokyo, where you can find quiet towns, hot springs and local food within a day trip or a weekend of the capital. More regions are coming.
Around Tokyo
- Tokyo: Japan’s capital needs no introduction, but even here there are neighborhoods most visitors never see.
- Kanagawa: South of Tokyo, Kanagawa stretches from the port city of Yokohama to the coast and the mountains.
- Saitama: Just north of Tokyo, Saitama opens up in the west into the mountains of Chichibu, home to river gorges, shrines and a UNESCO-listed winter festival.
- Chiba: East of Tokyo and home to Narita Airport, Chiba is a peninsula of fishing ports, coastal cliffs and old canal towns like Sawara.
- Ibaraki: Northeast of Tokyo, Ibaraki is home to Fukuroda Falls, pottery towns and seafood markets that Tokyo locals drive out for.
- Tochigi: North of Tokyo and beyond the famous shrines of Nikko, Tochigi has the pottery town of Mashiko, remote hot spring valleys and two of Japan’s great noodle and dumpling towns.
- Gunma: In the mountains northwest of Tokyo, Gunma is hot spring country, from riverside baths in Minakami to historic inns in quiet valleys.
- Niigata: On the Sea of Japan side, just over an hour from Tokyo by bullet train, Niigata is Snow Country: deep winters, famous rice and some of Japan’s finest sake.