Uozu Buried Forest Museum

**Late March to June for mirages, warm afternoons.** The bay's spring mirages need a particular combination of warm air over cold water and are most often seen on clear afternoons with a light southerly. The museum publishes a daily likelihood — check it the morning you go. **The stumps are the certainty.** Mirages may or may not happen; the buried forest is always there. Two-thousand-year-old cedar root systems in position, some still underwater, is worth the admission on its own. **Weekends are free for children.** Junior high age and under get in free on Saturdays, Sundays and holidays, which is unusual and worth knowing if you are travelling as a family. **Winter closes on Thursdays.** From December to mid-March the museum takes Thursdays off. The rest of the year it does not. **Combine with the coast road.** Uozu sits on the stretch where the Tateyama mountains rise straight out of the bay. On a clear winter morning the drive between here and Namerikawa has one of the best mountain-and-sea views in Japan.