Where to See Samurai History in Japan

• Main keep: five tiers on the outside, six floors above ground plus a basement inside.
• Gates and passageways: a network of original and restored gates that forms the maze-like approach.
• Nishi-no-Maru: the west bailey, once home to Princess Sen, with long corridors and views of the keep.
• Stone walls and moats: concentric moats and white-plastered walls around the grounds.

On my visits, queues for the steep interior staircases began building around 10:00 a.m., and an early start meant climbing at my own pace. The interior is darker than you expect, and the highlight is the two huge pillars rising through the floors. The outer moats and stone walls were almost empty when I walked them.

National Treasure (Main Keep); UNESCO World Heritage Site, inscribed 1993.

• The keep: a small wooden tower with a railed top-floor gallery and views over the Kiso River and the Owari plain.
• Honmachi-dori: the old merchant street that runs straight to the foot of the castle hill.
• Urakuen Garden and the Joan tea house: the garden below the castle, with a National Treasure tea house.
• Relocated castle gates: former castle gates carried to nearby temples and rebuilt there.

The original wooden stairs inside the keep are steep and narrow, so use the handrails and take your time.

National Treasure (keep and the Joan tea house).

• Otemon Gate and Tamon Yagura: the main entrance, built around a masugata courtyard with huge named stones just inside.
• Nishinomaru Garden: three Important Cultural Property structures, including Japan’s only surviving stone-built gunpowder magazine (1685).
• Toyotomi Stone Wall Museum: the buried Toyotomi-era walls.
• Main Tower: an 8-floor museum on Toyotomi Hideyoshi and the castle’s history.

Most visitors head straight for the Main Tower elevator, but the Stone Wall Museum is covered by the same ticket and takes only 15–20 minutes. Seeing it first makes the exhibits inside the tower easier to follow.

Important Cultural Property: Tamon Yagura, Sengan Yagura, Inui Yagura and Enshogura.

• Karamon Gate and Ninomaru Palace: the ornate gate dates from the 1626 imperial visit; the palace is where Yoshinobu consulted the domain retainers before returning power to the court in 1867.
• Honmaru Palace: a Meiji-era imperial residence, built when part of the Katsura-no-miya princely residence was relocated here. Interior visits need an advance reservation and a separate ticket.
• Keep base: the stone base can be climbed; the keep itself was lost to a lightning fire in 1750.
• Seiryu-en Garden: a garden within the castle grounds.

The keep-base ruins are open to climb, and the view from the top takes in the castle’s buildings and gardens. Honmaru Palace was moved here in the Meiji era from a princely residence, so don’t expect samurai-era interiors.

National Treasure (Ninomaru Palace); part of the UNESCO World Heritage Site “Historic Monuments of Ancient Kyoto”, inscribed 1994.

• Keep base: the stone base of the keep survives in the Honmaru area, and you can climb to the top. A reconstructed model of the keep is shown nearby.
• Fujimi-yagura turret: the only three-storey turret of Edo Castle still standing, rebuilt in 1659 after the Meireki fire.
• Guardhouses: the Doshin-bansho and Hyakunin-bansho, Edo-period guardhouses on the approach to the Honmaru, and the Obansho, restored to its Edo-period form in 1968.
• Otemon Gate: the Koraimon gate was rebuilt in 1659 and the Watari-yagura gate restored in 1967.
• Marked sites: for example the Matsu-no-Oroka Corridor site, where a marker and sign recall the 1701 attack by Asano Takumi-no-kami on Kira Kozuke-no-suke.

• Otemichi: the main approach, a straight run of stone steps.
• Tenshudai: the platform where the main tower stood.
• Retainers’ residence sites and Nobunaga’s Mausoleum: also part of the site.
• Sokenji Temple area: a Three-Story Pagoda and a Nio Gate.
• 360° panoramas: FTS publishes panoramas of Otemichi, the Tenshudai and other spots, so you can preview the site.

The stretch just before the Tenshudai is especially steep. After at least five visits, I strongly recommend sneakers or hiking shoes, since sandals or heels are dangerous here. Free walking sticks can be borrowed at the entrance counter.

National Special Historic Site. The Three-Story Pagoda and Nio Gate at Sokenji Temple are Important Cultural Properties.

• Odaka Castle Ruins: a stone marker near the former honmaru; the earthen ramparts are largely gone, though traces of the moat survive.
• Washizu Fort Ruins: preserved as a small park with a stone marker and information boards. No original buildings remain.
• Marune Fort Ruins: a stone marker at the site of the satellite fort.
• Two battlefield sites: the Okehazama Battlefield Legend Site in Toyoake, and Okehazama Battlefield Park (Dengaku-tsubo) in Nagoya. Each is presented as the place where Yoshimoto was killed.

Standing at the Washizu marker on its low hill, about 35 m up, you can see why the spot was used for a lookout and defence. Walking the distances between the sites turns the battle lines on a map into something you can feel.

National Historic Site: Odaka Castle Ruins with the attached Marune and Washizu Fort Ruins (designated 1938), and the Okehazama Battlefield Legend Site in Toyoake (designated 1937).

• Summit area: information panels, a memorial sculpture and a handful of later-era markers.
• Earthworks: surveys document fort-related earthworks, but they are not easy to pick out on the ground without prior knowledge.
• The walk after the lift: the lift does not reach the summit, so you still cover a stretch of dirt path and log-built steps.

Shizugatake is not primarily a place to see clear castle ruins. The terrain itself, with the lakes, the ridgelines and the low ground between them, gives you a sense of how large the battle was. It may feel underwhelming if you expect stone walls, a reconstructed keep or clearly visible moats and earthworks.

• Original: Ishikawa-mon Gate (rebuilt 1788), Sanjikken Nagaya (rebuilt 1858) and the Tsurumaru Warehouse.
• Reconstructed: Hishi Yagura and Gojikken Nagaya (2001), Kahoku-mon Gate (2010), and Nezumita-mon Gate and Bridge (2020).
• Gyokusen’inmaru Garden: restored in 2015 from historical records of the Maeda lords’ garden.

If seeing authentic Edo architecture is your priority, linger at Ishikawa-mon, Sanjikken Nagaya and the Tsurumaru Warehouse. Hishi Yagura and Kahoku-mon are impressive but modern. Inside the paid Nagaya, the timber framing is shown in detail.

Important Cultural Property: Ishikawa-mon Gate and Sanjikken Nagaya.

• Lanes and earthen walls: narrow, winding lanes with the Onosho Canal running in front of the residences.
• Nomura Family Residence: a residence with its interior open to the public, with a garden and shoin-style reception rooms.
• Ashigaru Museum: relocated and reconstructed foot-soldier residences.
• Kanazawa Shinise Kinenkan: a relocated former merchant house, originally a pharmacy.

In winter the earthen walls are wrapped in straw matting (komo-gake) to protect them from snow and frost. Winter visitors see the walls wrapped this way; the bends in the lanes show the castle-town road design.

• Yomeimon Gate: carved so densely that the structure almost disappears beneath the decoration.
• Sleeping Cat: the carving, traditionally credited to Hidari Jingoro, at the entrance to the path that leads to the Inner Sanctuary. On the reverse, two sparrows play in bamboo.
• Main shrine and worship hall: the central building; you remove your shoes to enter.
• Inner Sanctuary: a worship hall, Inuki-mon Gate and a bronze Treasure Pagoda in the cedar grove.

The Honjido (Crying Dragon Hall) exterior, the Sacred Stable and the Sleeping Cat are easier to photograph early in the morning. Lines began forming at several points after about 10 a.m. On my visit the Inner Sanctuary round trip took about 30 minutes in the quiet early morning.

The shrine lists Yomeimon Gate, the corridors (Kairo) on either side of it, Karamon Gate, the main shrine and the Sleeping Cat carving as National Treasures. Important Cultural Property: the Bronze Torii and Sakashita-mon Gate.

• Main shrine buildings: original 1617 woodwork, lacquered and painted.
• Other early-1600s structures: the two-storey gate, the sacred stable, the drum tower and the Hie Shrine.
• The mausoleum: reached by a further climb above the main hall.
• Views: Mount Fuji and Shimizu Port from the Nihondaira plateau, and Suruga Bay from the hill.

The old stone stairway is not modern engineered stairs. It was laid by hand, so step heights and depths vary; watch your feet on the way down. The walk from the gate to the main hall is short, so you spend your time on the carvings rather than in queues.

National Treasure: the main shrine buildings (designated December 2010). Important Cultural Property: the two-storey gate, sacred stable, drum tower, Hie Shrine and several other early-1600s structures.