Kawagoe is located in the Saitama prefecture only 1 hour away from Shibuya. I probably would have never thought of visiting Kawagoe before, but with the new Fukutoshin and Toyoko line connection, it made it so easy to get there that we had to give it a try. If you want to experience a traditional Japanese historical town near Tokyo, definitely come check this place out!
We left Shibuya around 11am and got to Kawagoe by noon. From the train station, you have to walk through the shotengai and it takes about 15-20min to reach this historic area named “Kurazukuri – zone”. The walk is not bad at all and you might get distracted at the shops along the way before you reach the old town (as we did…)
As soon as we reached the historic area though – wow, how awesome is this place? We had so much fun exploring this area. So many options of food & snacks to eat, traditional items/souvenirs to buy, people dressed in Kimonos, and just an overall great atmosphere. The main street is pretty busy with cars which kind of ruins the historic feeling but overall we enjoyed visiting here and got back to Tokyo just in time for dinner. My next post (Part 2) will share some of the foods/snacks we ate during our trip to Kawagoe.
Here’s a link to how to get to Kurazukuri-zone from Kawagoe-station. It’s in Japanese but hopefully the visual will give you an idea on how to get there. Kawagoe Sansaku
Love your blog! Keep it up!
I come to Tokyo 2 to 3 times a year for work. It is my favorite place.
Hello, I am following your blog from the feed, there are a lot of interesting places you talk about with beautiful photos! But it is really “mendokusai” to open the website every time to be able to read the full post (which is why I simply don’t read a lot of them) Please!! allow full view through the RSS.
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