Shizuoka Hidden Gems

Shizuoka is a long strip between Mt. Fuji and the Pacific, and the tea, the fish and the climate are all consequences of that geometry. The hillsides drain fast and catch morning fog, which is why the prefecture grows a large share of Japan's tea, with the Makinohara plateau given over to it almost entirely. Suruga Bay drops to 2,500 metres just offshore — the deepest bay in Japan — so Yaizu lands deep-water tuna and Sakura-ebi are netted nowhere else in the country. Fuji itself is closest here, and the classic compositions with the mountain behind a tea field or the pines of Miho no Matsubara are Shizuoka views rather than Yamanashi ones. The eastern end is the Izu peninsula, a volcanic thumb of hot springs and coves that Tokyo has used as a weekend escape for a century. The whole prefecture sits on the Tokaido, so nothing here is hard to reach.