Chubu & the Japan Alps

Kanazawa — Edo Preserved Without the Crowds

Photo: Boris Dahm / Pexels

Kanazawa was one of Japan's wealthiest feudal cities outside Edo and Osaka — the Maeda clan ruled here for 280 years, funding craft traditions that survive today: Kenroku-en (one of Japan's three great gardens), the Higashi Chaya geisha district, lacquerware, gold leaf, and a seafood market that locals rank alongside Tsukiji. Because no major air raid touched the city in World War II, Edo-period streets still stand largely as they were built.

Kenroku-en opens at dawn; arrive before the gates fill with tour groups and the garden is quiet enough to hear the water. The Higashi Chaya district east of the Asanogawa river has three teahouse streets intact. The Omicho covered market — 170 stalls, enormous king crab, Noto-grown vegetables — is the honest commercial heart of the city and the best place to eat lunch.

The Hokuriku Shinkansen links Kanazawa to Tokyo in 2.5 hours and to Osaka via Tsuruga in under 2 hours — making it viable as a destination or a scenic stop on a cross-country route.

Shirakawa-go — Thatched Roofs Under Metres of Snow

Photo: Pitipat Usanakornkul / Pexels

Shirakawa-go is a UNESCO World Heritage village in the mountains where the Shō river divides Gifu and Toyama prefectures. Its gassho-zukuri farmhouses — named for hands pressed in prayer — have steep thatched roofs pitched to shed snowfall that can reach four metres in winter. A handful of the largest houses still function as working farms; others have been converted to minshuku guesthouses where guests sleep above silkworm-rearing floors unchanged since the eighteenth century.

Most visitors come on day trips from Nagoya, Kanazawa, or Osaka. Winter is the peak season — the village is illuminated on select evenings, and snow on the roofs produces the scene's most iconic look. In summer the crowds thin and the rice paddies around the village turn vivid green.

Matsumoto Castle — The Crow Castle

Photo: Robs Quiambao / Pexels

Matsumoto-jo is one of twelve original castles surviving in Japan — never demolished, never extensively reconstructed. Its six-storey black-and-white keep, reflected in the outer moat with the Kita Alps behind it, is one of the country's most reproduced images. The castle dates to the 1590s; the interior wooden staircases and the Moon Viewing Tower added in the 1630s are original.

The city around the castle is compact and walkable. The Nakamachi kura district preserves merchant storehouses in white and black plaster. The Matsumoto City Museum of Art holds Japan's largest collection of Yayoi Kusama's work — she was born here. Nawate-dori, the frog street along the river, has the small shops and unhurried atmosphere that Kyoto's Higashiyama once had before the tourist buses arrived.

Nagoya — The City That Feeds the Country

Photo: Heather Mallon / Pexels

Nagoya is Japan's fourth largest city and its manufacturing centre — Toyota, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, and JTEKT were all built here. It does not sell itself to tourists, which is partly what makes it interesting. The food culture is aggressively regional: miso katsu (tonkatsu in thick hatcho-miso sauce), kishimen flat noodles, hitsumabushi eel over rice, and ogura toast with sweet red bean paste for breakfast. These are not found in the same form anywhere else in Japan.

Nagoya Castle's keep is a post-war reconstruction, but the Hommaru Palace — the wooden palatial complex attached to it — was meticulously rebuilt to original Edo-period specifications using traditional techniques and reopened in 2018. Atsuta Shrine, the second most sacred Shinto site in Japan after Ise, sits in the southern city; it holds the Kusanagi sword, one of the three imperial regalia, and its forested grounds feel nothing like the tourist version of Japan.

Hakuba — Alpine Skiing and Summer Trekking

Photo: Shashank Brahmavar / Pexels

Hakuba hosted the 1998 Winter Olympics and remains Japan's most internationally known ski area. Nine interconnected resorts — Happo-One, Goryu, 47, Iwatake, Cortina among them — cover terrain for every level, from wide groomed runs to steep backcountry accessed by lift. Average snowfall exceeds 11 metres in a season; the powder rivals Hokkaido's Niseko without the same degree of international crowding.

In summer the same mountains become a trekking destination. The Northern Alps trail to Shirouma-dake passes one of Japan's last remaining snowfields — the Daisekkei, accessible from July — and the Happo-one gondola opens for views across the entire Hakuba range. The village below retains a working farm character: the Swiss-style accommodation built after the Olympics sits alongside rice fields and onion farms.

• Best powder: Cortina (off-piste specialists) and Goryu (tree runs)
• Beginners: Hakuba 47 and Iwatake — wide gentle runs with good English instruction
• Summer: Shirouma-dake trail via Daisekkei snowfield (late July–August only)
• Getting there: Shinjuku → Matsumoto by Express Azusa (2.5 h), then Ōito Line to Hakuba (50 min)

Getting Around Chubu

• Tokyo → Kanazawa: Hokuriku Shinkansen (Kagayaki / Hakutaka), ~2.5 hours
• Osaka/Kyoto → Kanazawa: Thunderbird limited express to Tsuruga, then Shinkansen, ~2 hours
• Nagoya → Shirakawa-go: Highway bus ~2.5 hours (no train connection)
• Nagoya → Matsumoto: Wide View Shinano limited express, ~2 hours
• Matsumoto → Hakuba: JR Ōito Line local train, ~50 minutes