Friday 16 January 2026 – Chikuma, Ueda and Tokyo

The Ryokan morning….

We’d been staying overnight in a Ryokan (a traditional Japanese Inn) in Chikuma, about 30km out of Nagano. We’d decided to do a night in a Ryokan in an Onsen town as something different from the Airbnb apartments. Most Ryokans included some meals and Kamsei Ryokan where we were staying, had excellent reviews for their onsen and food. We’d all enjoyed our relax in the onsen the previous night and a very delicious individually prepared meal. I’m not sure I was looking forward to sleeping on the futons, but our family room was pretty spacious and at this stage of the trip I was pretty tired! The futons on tatami mats weren’t terrible, although the pillows left a bit to be desired. With my current ear infection and sore neck it wasn’t the best nights sleep I’ve ever had but the doonas were definitely pretty comfortable, and provided a bit of extra padding when wrapped around us.

We had breakfast included as part of our stay, so in the morning we head down to the dining area in our yukata and another feast awaited us. Like dinner, we each had our own set meal.

Soren and Zinnia had kids meals, which again annoyed Soren as he wanted the sweet river fish in the adult meal. Astrid and Anto got all sorts of fish, pickles, egg custards and all 4 of the meat eating members of the family got onsen eggs (eggs cooked in the onsen water).

I had a vegetarian set which had some interesting bits. Most were tasty except the local potato dish that looked and tasted like snot. It was a hard pass on that one. The tofu in soy broth was pretty delicious though.

The Onsen…..

After breakfast we head off for our onsen. Our room had a toilet and wash basin, but you showered in the onsen. The water was a lovely temperature and it’s a small Ryokan so the onsen was usually pretty quiet. We all enjoyed a soak and shower and using the creams and lotions. The outdoor pool was a lovely temperature in the cool morning air.

It was then time to get dressed into real clothes, pack our stuff and head out for the day. When we returned to our room, they had turned it back into ‘day time mode’ and Astrid’s bunny had pride of place at the table, which the kids found hilarious.

Soren did get to enjoy using the geta (Japanese sandals) he’d been so keen on trying to purchase while we were in Japan. We all found the Ryokan experience to be an interesting one. One night was enough on floor beds but the onsen and meals were fabulous and the staff (owners) were lovely. It was definitely worth doing.

Checking out Chikuma……

We packed up the car and had a quick walk around the local Chikuma neighbourhood. It was a cold but sunny morning and not many people were out and about yet.

The kids had a short play in the park but we dragged them back to the car, as we had plenty of sight-seeing in our morning before it was time to head back to Tokyo for the last leg of our trip.

Off to Ueda Castle…..

It was another mildly terrifying drive on narrow roads to nearby Ueda, which was about 25km away. We were returning the hire car here and catching our shinkansen to Tokyo, but the Ueda castle happens to rate pretty well so we figured we’d pay it a visit.

It was a Friday and it wasn’t super busy, so it was easy to get a park and wander into the castle grounds. The castle dates back to the Edo period and is located on a hill overlooking a branch of the Chikuma river, which acts as a moat for the castle.

The castle was rather pretty and had great views of the town and surrounding mountains. There were also some fun photo spots for the kids and the moat (which was partially frozen as it was pretty cold here still) had plenty of ducks.

We all enjoyed the photo ops, some planned and some not! Soren and Zinnia loved the construction signs with people looking sad, so had to do their own version 🙂

It was a beautiful and sunny Winter morning in Nagano prefecture. In our travels around Nagano over the past few days the mountain views had been beautiful.

Although the castle was originally built in the 16th century by leaders of the Sanada sumurai clan, following some battles and consequential destruction, some of the castle was rebuilt in the 17th century. It was never completed.

The castle grounds are populated with cherry blossoms in Spring and had samurai patrolling the grounds and posing for photos and providing martial arts demonstrations. It was off-season today so we missed seeing any samurai but the castle grounds, impressive stone walls of the castle and the shrines were all worth a visit.

It was then a short drive to Ueda station, where Anto deposited the girls and I with all the luggage while he and Soren went to return our car. It was now back to public transport for the rest of our trip, but less driving down snowy and tiny roads. We bid farewell to our little Japanese van. It had been a useful way to explore a lot of Nagano prefecture in a few days.

The final Shinkansen…..

We picked up some lunch at one of the train station convenience stores. My lunch included (aside from the usual egg sandwhich) some oyaki – a Nagano traditional dumpling like bun with fillings that were actually vegetarian! We’d been meaning to try these local treats while in Nagano, and kept coming across them just after we’d eaten. Anto found some at the station convenience store, which then served me for a few meals once we got to Tokyo. They were much better fried off!

This was our last shinkansen for the trip and it was pretty quick and easy at about an hour and 20 minutes end to end. Soren, who was still not feeling super, spent most of it sleeping on my lap. The girls spent their time working their way through convenience store snacks and drinks!

Once we arrived into Tokyo we had a metro transfer and luckily only a short walk to our apartment. We are staying in Taito city this time around but are conveniently located next to a metro line.

We had been told we could leave our bags in our apartment if we arrived before the 4pm check in time, while it was still being cleaned. We arrived a fair bit ahead of schedule, just after 2.30pm but the cleaning lady was just finishing up so we managed to get the bags in and then all get out of our snow boots. We’d needed these in Nagano over the past few days, with some pretty cold temperatures and plenty of snow, but not in Tokyo as it was a lovely 16 degrees when we arrived.

A quick bit of unpacking. The last time for this trip!….and it was off exploring.

Exploring Asakusa…..

We walked from our apartment down through the Asakusa district to wards the nearby Senso-ji temple, which we didn’t get to on our last trip here, and was on the agenda for a visit. There were plenty of things to look at on our wander. We were staying in the kitchenware district and we’d make use of some shopping time in the area before we left Tokyo.

We also found we could see Tokyo Skytree on the walk towards Senso-Ji Temple. Like the temple, we hadn’t made it to the Skytree on the last Tokyo visit, so it was also on the agenda for the kids.

Senso-Ji Temple…..

It was a pretty short walk to Sensō-ji Temple. After our quiet morning castle experience in Ueda, it was back to crazy crowds here. Sensō-ji, is an ancient Buddhist temple in Asakusa, Tokyo, Japan. It is Tokyo’s oldest-established temple (completed in 645), and one of its most significant, as well as one of the most colourful and popular temples.

The legend says that in the year 628, two brothers fished a statue of Kannon, the goddess of mercy, out of the Sumida River, and even though they put the statue back into the river, it always returned to them. Consequently, Sensoji was built nearby for the goddess of Kannon. The temple was completed in 645, making it Tokyo’s oldest temple. Sensoji, is also known as Asakusa Kannon Temple.

We checked out the souvenir and food shops that lined the shopping street that is over 200m long. The street stretches from the Kaminarimon (Thunder Gate) to the temples second gate, the Hozomon. Alongside typical Japanese souvenirs such as yukata and folding fans, various traditional local snacks from the Asakusa area are sold along the Nakamise (shopping street). 

There were plenty of tourists dressed in kimonos, wandering the shopping street and in the temple. It’s always fun to see the beautiful outfits and the compulsory selfies that are taken when kitted up!

Beyond the Hozomon Gate stands the temple’s main hall and a five storied pagoda. Destroyed in the war, the buildings are relatively recent reconstructions. The Asakusa Shrine, built in the year 1649, stands immediately adjacent to the temple’s main building.

It was now late afternoon and the crowds were building but we did get some amazing light as we walked through the main hall and out into the temple gardens.

Even in the depths of Winter, the gardens were very pretty. The kids loved checking the giant koi in the pond. The water was indeed bright blue in the stream.

We could still see the Skytree from the Sensō-jii Temple complex…. and we all decided that was going to be our next stop, once we’d finished enjoying the wander around the garden.

Sunsets and the Skytree….

Given we weren’t far from the Tokyo Skytree and it was a nice afternoon, we thought we might as well walk there as we planned to visit during our few days here in Tokyo. On the way to the Skytree, Soren found a shop with geta sandals and was still pondering whether to spend his pocket money on some.

On our walk over the river, the Skytree tower was beautifully lit up in the afternoon light. Astrid and Zinnia didn’t enjoy the heights of Umeda Sky Building in Osaka, in particular, the glass lift and escalators, so they weren’t so convinced about going up the Skytree.

The Umeda sky building in Osaka is 173m high but the Skytree is 640m high (the tallest tower in the world). The Skytree is so tall that you can see it from most parts of Tokyo. We were now standing under the tower, looking up, and yep it’s very tall!

Zinnia was particularly unconvinced that going up all that way was a good idea, and was taking some convincing. Ironically, from me, hater of heights. But once we were in the lift and heading up it was fine. Unlike the Uemda Sky Building, the Skytree has no glass lifts and it’s pretty fast and painless. We were at the Tembo observation deck in about 30 seconds which is at 350m high.

We’d timed our arrival to see the city at dusk. The views were pretty good and you could even see Mt Fuji today, nicely silhouetted in the distance. We checked out the vastness of Tokyo, and found some landmarks, and of course admired Mt Fuji in the distance.

Everyone was trying to get the shot of Mt Fuji, as the sunset behind it. The lights on all the buildings were starting to come on, so it was a great time to visit.

After a couple of laps around the observation deck, the sun had set and we got to see the city all lit up. We walked down a floor to the glass floor observation deck, where Anto (and surprisingly Zinnia) wanted to stand and look down to ground level. This was definitely a step too far for me.

While I’m not a fan of heights the view from up the Skytree was definitely worth the visit. You can absolutely appreciate Tokyo from this viewpoint!

Shopping, souvenirs and tasty dinner….

Now we all declared that we were over tall things on this trip. We’d been up quite a few! We head back down into the Skytree shopping centre and decided to find some dinner….. after dragging Zinnia away from more Hello Kitty items!

One of the shopping centre food courts had plenty of good food options and I even found some veggie tempura (which was fish free as you could buy it buy the piece). The kids got huge rice bowls with fresh salmon and tuna and Anto had some ramen. They were all pretty impressed with their dinner selection.

With full tummies we then had a mission to visit some of the stores in the Skytree mall to pick up some souvenirs for friends back home. We could have shopped for hours but it was getting late and the step count for the day was creeping up.

After we completed our souvenir acquisition missions we negotiated the trains and found our way back to the apartment. We were all a bit tired as it was now close to 9pm. In retrospect this is the earliest we got back any of the nights in Tokyo! At least tonight we had some non-floor based beds to collapse into.

Up next…..

Exploring more of Tokyo, with Meiji Shrine, complete with ice sculptures, Harajuku, Shibuya Crossing, Ginza, shopping and then the Government Metropolitan Building light show!