Nagoya, Aichi
Nagoya is the 3rd largest metro area in Japan and happens to be close to where we are staying (wife’s parents house in Mie). We took a 20 minute car ride to Kuwana, Mie and hopped on a local train for 30 minutes to Nagoya station.
Nagoya Castle
The castle is 3 subway stations from Nagoya station, and sits inside two sets of moats/castle walls. The inner portion holds the two castle keeps and a palace/residence which are the highlights of the show. Unfortunately, the main keep is under renovation for the next few years, so it was closed for exploring. We will have to make another trip after it reopens someday.
Nagoya Castle and the Hommarugoten (Palace) have been rebuilt, so they are not the originals from several hundred years ago. The castle had seen little actual combat, but was destroyed during WW2 bombings, which unfortunately is a common theme for castles in Japan. Unfortunately, the rebuild in the 50s included the use of steel/concrete so it’s not entirely authentic, but the current renovations will rebuild with more historically accurate materials and building techniques.
Hommarugoten was rebuilt recently (2018) so the palace looks entirely new still and quite lavish with beautiful paintings on the canvas doors/walls. The endless maze of rooms, gardens and decorated hallways must have been a show of power back in it’s heyday. The walk-through took about 20-30 minutes, just be prepared to wait in line/outside/heat before getting in!
Fancy room, maybe for guests and entertaining.
The important folks hung out here, it was also raised a bit higher, lots of ceiling art and fancy carvings above the doors.
There was an exhibit with some samurai gear, including this armor and a lot of guns from the 1700-1900. Can you spot the bullet dents in the armor?
Nagoya TV Tower
From the castle, we walked towards the Hisaya Ōdori Park. There was a Sumo tournament near the castle, so we caught quite a few wrestlers wandering about. M (daughter) commented, ‘who are these big fat guys’ but I don’t think they heard or understood English.
The Nagoya TV Tower is pretty old, and obviously inspired by the Eiffel Tower. It predates the Tokyo Tower, so I guess it’s the OG of the Eiffel replicas. You can walk up to the observation deck, but we took the elevator and saved our energy for later.
We noticed a raised fountain/walkway just a couple blocks away, so we went to check that out as well. There was a bunch of underground shops and a sake tasting event going on… tempting, maybe next time!
The park had a lot of restaurants and a beer garden area. I imagine it’s popular on weekends and nice weather. All that walking in the heat made us crave for some ice cream, so we made our way back to Nagoya Station and found a Japanese deserts shop. I wanted to have my first Anmitsu in many years and it really hit the spot. Anmitsu is a combo of sweet red-beans, (matcha or vanilla) ice cream, clear jelly, mochi and syrup). Maybe it can be described as a Japanese sundae?
Heading back to Mie
We were tired and it was time to head back before dinner. The only proper way to cap off a day in Nagoya, was to bring home some chicken wings from Yamachan. They were peppery and got your hands all messy, too bad they were a bit cold by the time we got home.
We also decided to take the train all the way home, (usually we get picked up at a bigger station from the parents and drive the last 20 minutes or so). The last leg switches us to a retro-style train that is operated by 1 guy. There is usually only 2 or 3 cars to the train, since there isn’t a lot of people riding it in the countryside. However, there were some train enthusiasts that were riding with us, who were filming and taking pictures. The train controls/dials were all analog and the conductor sported an old school pocket watch. Way to own being a small country-side operation! Only downside, the tickets were a bit pricey and the train only comes every 30 minutes. We weren’t in a rush:)
