Hidden Gems Across Japan
1,610 spots
Utsukushigahara Open-Air Museum
Utsukushigahara Open-Air Museum (美ヶ原高原美術館) is Japan's highest art museum, located at 2,000 meters elevation on the Utsuk…
Togakushi Shrine
Togakushi Shrine (戸隠神社) is a complex of five Shinto shrines scattered across the forested slopes of Mount Togakushi, con…
Matsumoto Performing Arts Centre
The Matsumoto Performing Arts Centre (まつもと市民芸術館, opened 2004) is a striking contemporary building designed by architect…
Shiraito Falls (Karuizawa)
Shiraito Falls (白糸の滝, 'White Thread Falls') is a 70-meter-wide curtain waterfall where hundreds of thin streams cascade…
Karuizawa Resort Town
Karuizawa (軽井沢) is Japan's original resort town, established in 1886 when Canadian missionary Alexander Croft Shaw built…
Tateyama Kurobe Alpine Route (Nagano side)
The Tateyama Kurobe Alpine Route (立山黒部アルペンルート) is a 90km mountain sightseeing route crossing the Northern Japanese Alps…
Hotaka Mountain Range
The Hotaka Range runs along the spine of the Northern Japanese Alps, a series of 3,000-meter peaks connected by knife-ed…
Hokusai Museum
The Hokusai-kan Museum (北斎館) in Obuse displays works by ukiyo-e master Katsushika Hokusai (1760–1849) created during the…
Matsumoto City Museum of Art
Matsumoto City Museum of Art (松本市美術館) is dedicated primarily to Yayoi Kusama, the avant-garde artist known for her polka…
Nakamachi Street
Nakamachi (中町通り) is Matsumoto's former merchant district, lined with traditional kura storehouses built in the late 1800…
Magome-juku
Magome-juku (馬籠宿) is another Nakasendo post town, built on a steep hillside with dramatic views of the Kiso Valley and M…
Tsumago-juku
Tsumago was a post station on the Nakasendo, the mountain road that linked Kyoto and Tokyo during the Edo period. When t…
Nagano Wine Country
Nagano Prefecture has emerged as one of Japan's premier wine regions, with its high elevation (600–900m), volcanic soil,…
Shinshu Apples
Nagano Prefecture is Japan's second-largest apple producer (after Aomori), with the Nagano Basin's climate and volcanic…
Obuse Chestnut Sweets
Obuse grows chestnuts the way Napa grows grapes — with obsessive attention to terroir, varietal selection, and centuries…
Illustration — not a photographShinshu Soba
Nagano Prefecture (historically called Shinano or Shinshu) is Japan's premier soba-producing region, thanks to its high…
Hakuba Valley
Hakuba Valley (白馬) is a collection of 10 interconnected ski resorts in the Northern Japanese Alps, host of alpine skiing…
Bessho Onsen (Nagano)
Bessho Onsen (別所温泉) is a quiet hot spring town with a remarkable concentration of Kamakura-period (1185–1333) temples, e…
Shibu Onsen
Shibu Onsen has operated for 1,300 years as a hot spring village, and walking its cobblestone alleys at night under gas…
Nozawa Onsen
Nozawa Onsen (野沢温泉) is a 700-year-old hot spring village that doubles as one of Japan's premier ski resorts. The village…
Daio Wasabi Farm
Daio Wasabi Farm (大王わさび農場) is Japan's largest wasabi cultivation facility, covering 15 hectares of terraced fields fed b…
Jigokudani Snow Monkey Park
Jigokudani Yaen-koen (地獄谷野猿公苑, 'Hell Valley Wild Monkey Park') is the only place in the world where wild Japanese macaqu…
Kamikochi Valley
Kamikochi sits at 1,500 meters in a glacial valley carved between 3,000-meter peaks. The road in closes mid-November thr…
Matsumoto Castle
Matsumoto Castle (松本城) is one of Japan's five National Treasure castles and the oldest surviving original wooden donjon…
Estimated from distance to the nearest airport or shinkansen station. Confirm actual journey times before you travel.