Arriving in TAKAYAMA ✨ Street Food Tour, Old Town & Scenic Train from Nagoya – Gifu, Japan 2025

Arriving in TAKAYAMA ✨ Street Food Tour, Old Town & Scenic Train from Nagoya – Gifu, Japan 2025

also help the buildings Today we’re going to Takayama, one of the most beautiful and chill places I’ve ever been in Japan. First, we’re taking a very scenic train from Nagoya. We’ll explore the old town, have a street food tour, and I’ll show you why Takayama is the place to go if you want to see historic Japan and beautiful countryside. It’s such a change of pace from Tokyo. We’re starting off in Nagoya. If you’re thinking of adding this to your itinerary, Takayama is two hours, 15 minutes on the train from Nagoya and Nagoya is about an hour and a half from Tokyo on the shinkansen. Wow, it’s busy in Nagoya Station this morning. Lots of people going to work. 8:43 to Toyama. Hida Express number 3 Platform 11. I’m using a regional rail pass, the Alpine Takayama Matsumoto area tourist pass. You can go on as many trains as you like and make up to four seat reservations. This sign’s a little unusual. It tells you where to wait on the platform for each carriage. Here we are here. Here’s boarding position number 26. I’ve not seen that system before. Usually they have the carriage numbers. *Japanese announcements* *Japanese announcements* This train’s called the Wide View Hida because it has large windows, so you can enjoy the countryside views. *Japanese announcements* Ooh, nice colours on this train! It takes about two hours, 15 minutes to get from Nagoya to Takayama. I’ve been looking forward to taking this train because I’ve heard it’s a really scenic route through the countryside. I heard the best views on the right hand side of the train, so I’ve got to see it on the right. Then when we sat down on, I saw on the left, and then there was an announcement saying, don’t worry if we’re going backwards in about 20 minutes, the train will change direction and start going the other way, when we change onto a different line. So when it changes direction, we might be on the left hand side. So I’ll let you know how that goes. In the end, there were views on both sides. Maybe the other side had slightly more. I don’t know if it was just me thinking the other side’s always better, but in any case there were empty seats so I could scoot over to take pictures. This was midweek at the start of June. This is a hybrid train. And just now on the display there was a little diagram showing where the train’s getting its energy from and what it’s using batteries and what it’s using fuel. Thank you to Japan Railways., JR Central, for providing my rail pass and hotel in Takayama. They didn’t pay me to make this video or tell me anything I have to say or include. We just left Gifu Station and the train’s now changed direction. So now we’re on the left. which is the opposite side to the one I wanted to book So if you’re going from Nagoya, you might want to book a seat on the left hand side, and you’ll end up on the right hand side. The right hand side is the side you want to be on. You see a castle over there on the mountain? It’s a fish train! It’s just one carriage long. The best scenery is yet to come, but I loved seeing all these rice fields filled with water. The scenery only gets more spectacular as you travel through Gifu Prefecture Wow! The Hida River. I’d recommend doing this train journey in the daytime if you can, so you can enjoy all the views. Countryside like this is something you just don’t see in Tokyo, Kyoto or Osaka. It’s good that the trade announcements are pointing out interesting things to look out for along the way, and saying if they’re on the left or the right, like the castle earlier, and now the Hida River. This was in early summer at the start of June. I can only imagine how beautiful it is in autumn with the coloured leaves. The train partially follows the river. The region’s mountainous, so it’s not constant views. You get snatches of them past valleys and scenic viewpoints. We sent our luggage by Takkyubin, a luggage sending service, which I have a video about. But there are luggage racks on the train and a space behind the last row of seats. And overhead racks for smaller bags. It’s been interesting to see the landscape change as we left the city of Nagoya. And then we started seeing rice fields and then it became more mountainous. And now there’s the river, with all the rocks and some stunning views. We’re starting to get some of views on the left side now as well. That’s seat C and D. hours, 15 minutes goes by really quickly. You don’t even need any entertainment other than looking out the window. The train is comfortable with a decent amount of legroom. We just stopped at Gero, which is a popular onesen town. The announcement said it’s one of Japan’s top three onsen, along with Kusatsu Onsen and Arima Onsen, which is near Kobe. We don’t have any train snacks today because we had breakfast at the hotel. I’ve just got a water. Boring, but it’s a hot day. And Phil’s got this salt lime drink. In the summer in Japan, you get these drinks with salt in them because it’s so hot. You need to keep the salts up in your body, as well as staying hydrated. be getting snacks when we arrive in Takayama later in the video. Takayama.’s food was the best. I didn’t expect it to be so good. Here’s where the bathrooms are, in the area between the carriages. There’s a little area here with a sink And lots of mirrors. And right here…. There’s a Nano Museum. This is Ise katagami. And this is where the bins are. I love how the rice fields look, like a mirror reflecting the mountains. And now we’re arriving in Takayama. Can you see that unusual building in the distance? I wonder what that is. There’s a waiting area here before you go through the ticket gates. That suggests it must get quite busy here sometimes. Takayama seems quite different from the other stations on the line. As soon as we started getting in, you can see it’s a much bigger city than the other towns we went through. And there are a lot more people here. A lot more people with suitcases as well. See the Hotel Around? Hotel Around! Hotel around Takayama. Right here at the station they’ve got some cross-sections of floats from the Takayama Festival. They said on the train it’s one of the top regional festivals in Japan. Imagine that going through the streets. We dropped off our backpacks to be delivered to our hotel. The Hotel Associa Takayama Resort. There’ll be a video coming out all about it, and the fantastic spa. Right next to the I-Cafe, there are also some coin lockers which can always be useful, especially on the day you’re checking out. There’s some large size lockers here with suitcases for ¥900. There’s lots of small ones for ¥400. These are good for backpacks. Oh there’s extra large, extra large, ¥1,100. There is a money changer if you don’t have any coins on you. There’s a video on my channel about how to use coin lockers. It’s really easy. Right by the station is a tourist office. And there’s a stamp! They’ve got the same design in three sizes. That’s very convenient I’ll go for the big one, I think. Please stamp gently. That’s the kanji for yama. So I guess it’s Takayama. Here’s some nice fountains by the station. It says this is a traditional you wood carving, but it doesn’t say why his arms are so long. There’s another one across there. It’s a yokai, a Japanese monster, called Ashinaga Tenaga. Ashinaga have long legs and Tenaga have long arms, to go fishing and reach fish out of the depths. It says the shape of this monument varies depending on the angle you look at it from. From this angle, it is like a sarubobo, which is a souvenir from Takayama. supposed to bring good luck. And from this angle, it looks like a gingko tree leaf. This side’s supposed to look like a Japanese yew berry. Is there a fourth side? A square lattice. We’re just walking from the station towards the river, and this is a lot quieter than I expected it to be here, when we saw how many people were at the station. it’s a Tuesday, so it’s a weekday and it’s right at the start of June. It’s a Wednesday. I don’t know what day it is when we’re away! That way is back towards the station. There’s lots of pretty buildings so far. It seems very quiet. Here’s a map of the city. We are here. There’s the river. And the old town is across the river. We’ve moved over one to more of a main street to see what’s down here. This side street looks nice with the lanterns. This feels very different to being in Tokyo. Yesterday we moved from Tokyo to Nagoya, which was already a lot more chilled and spacious than Tokyo. And then this is completely different again. We’re spending three nights in Takayama. It’s quite a sleepy town and it’s not that big. So it’s a real change of pace, which we needed after a few days in hectic Tokyo. At first I thought we might get bored, but we relaxed into it. Took a few day trips, and by the time we left, I hadn’t even done everything there is to Just here on the main street, there’s a little place where you can do archery. Ten shots for ¥700. Oh, oh. We’re not doing very well. That wasn’t as bad as some of them. Oh, I got the target. I’m just happy I hit the target. Oh, Oh! Oh. Three points. Oh, I think I should get something for hitting the other arrow. The one on the pole… Yeah, how many points is that?! That was fun. It was quite hard. We’re not pros, but Phil did pretty well. You got ten points and I got three points. EIt’s only two arrows at two out of ten. You have to point quite far to the left. Yes. I’m not used to it. I’ve not done archery a lot, but usually you aim down the arrow. But this is to the left. So, took a while to figure out what to aim at. You’re not aiming at what you expect. That’s our excuse anyway. Okay. Good fun. This is just on the main street. The river is just opposite there. We’re almost at the river. And here’s the river. This is nice to come across on a warm day That guy’s got long legs; that guy’s got long arms again. Oh, yeah. Can you see? The statue’s got long arms, and the one across the way has long legs. What is it with all these long arms, & legs in Takayama? I didn’t expect the market to still be on, but apparently we’ve got two minutes till it closes at 12. It’s just along by the river. Oh, there’s your beef sushi. Looks like they’re packing up now. We’re going to come back another time and look at it properly when everything’s open. Looks like we’re coming into the old town. Look at all these historic buildings. All the dark wood. We were going to go to a tofu restaurant for lunch, but of course it’s closed on Wednesdays and it’s a Wednesday today. So we decided to just get snacks around the old town. Phil’s starting off with some Hida beef sushi. There are several varieties of high quality beef in Japan, not just Kobe beef. And Hida beef is from this region. You can have lean, medium, fat or premium. Phils going to go for one of the premium and one of the lean to compare. and it’s cash only. You have to go inside to eat. This door is really small for some reason. The premium one is the pink one. And that’s the lean. It’s on a shrimp cracker so you can eat the plate as well. that was really nice. It’s really soft. That’s the cheaper one. Very good. So I look forward to this one. And this is the premium. That was much softer. It’s, like the higher grade beefs. Really really good. I kind of prefer the cheaper one. It’s got a bit more flavor. The texture with the premium one better, but they’re both excellent. How’s the plate? Is that the best bit?! It’s a shrimp rice cracker. nice We stopped off at this cafe for some treats. *Japanese* Phil’s got an ice cream in a cone with an extra end of a cone. Cremia Ice cream a premium soft serve made with Hokkaido cream. You can get it at various places around Japan and it’s the real deal. This is really delicious ice cream. I wasn’t expecting that, but properly flavoured. It’s good. I want to try some! That is good. It’s good. Yeah. Pretty good. I’ve gone for these. I’m not sure what they’re called exactly. They’re a bit like taiyaki with filling. But the way she was making them wasn’t like a taiyaki with batter. She put in a little tiny sheet of something and then added the filling, and then grilled it like a taiyaki. You can have a mixture of flavours. I’ve gone for red bean, custard and chocolate. This is a red bean flavor. It’s got a whole red beans inside. It’s quite crispy and crunchy. I’ve got a gohei mochi. which is a large rice cake on a stick with savoury sauce. It’s grilled as well. Hot. Mmm It has a nice texture. It’s kind of crispy on the outside. The sauce is a bit sticky. It’s kind of sweet and savory. I’m not sure what the sauce is made of. I think I saw yesterday, it’s got peanuts in it, amongst… probably soy sauce. The mochi does have kind of a rice-y texture. Nice one. I got sauce on my face? I’m glad I could try that. I wanted to try it on the Nakasendo trail, because I thought it was a regional specialty of Tsumago and Magome. But by the time we got to the end of the trial, all the shops were shut, so I couldn’t try it there. I thought it’d be busier than this in the old town. There are quite a few people here, and obviously it’s a very touristy place and there are some guided tours going around with guides with flags. But it’s not that rammed and the queues for things aren’t very long. The cafes we’ve gone into had plenty of seats spare. The old town’s the sort of place that exists only for tourists to come and enjoy. The more everyday part of Takayama is the other side of the station, but this area still feels authentic. Prices are very reasonable, so while it’s touristy, it’s not a tourist trap. The streets are quite narrow, so I can see how it could get crowded in a busier season, and it was much quieter than I expected. If you’ve been at another time of year, tell me what it was like in the comments. A top tip is make sure you bring cash with you, because a lot of places are cash only, and some of them even have signs saying know 10,000 or ¥5000 notes. So make sure you’ve got change. There’s a change machine at the station, in the room with the lockers, that we use several times to get smaller change. There’s a Miffy Kitchen store. Cute! And this store specialises in honey and honey related things. Honey ice cream with honeycomb in There’s a little bee model in front of the shop. It’s called Sugi Bee garden. honey, or mango and honey. That looks nice. Yeah. Blueberry and honey. Honey drink float. I do like a float. And look, there’s inari dango. Sweet potato dumpling. That’s the regional specialty of Kumamoto that I didn’t try when I was there either. Maybe we can clear up all the regional specialties here. There’s a little display of honeycomb inside the shop. There’s other special honey goods. Manuka honey, honey nuts… Orange honey. Different flavors. Rosemary honey. Lychee honey. Do you think this is a big lump of beeswax. It’s quite a realistic food model with the steam coming out It’s cute paper. This looks really sticky on the outside. Oh, it’s stretchy as well. This is also very hot. Ah That’s really soft, chewy. The outside is a bit like pizzaman outside, but softer. You’ve got sweet potato and red bean on the top. The sweet potato is really sweet. It does taste more potatoe-y than sweet potato normally does. These would all be really good winter foods, I think. All these mochiand dango. The old town continues over a couple of blocks. As always, the further you wander, the fewer people there are. The streets are lovely, with old wooden architecture, and there are so many snacks. It’s a lovely place for strolling and taking photos. These must be sake breweries. This ball of cedar twigs is put out at the start of the year show when the fresh sake’s ready. It starts off green, then turns brown as the fresh sake matures. There’s so many snacks along here. All the cookies, soft cream orangette. Hida beef and ratatouille focaccia pizza. They’ve got traditional Japanese sweets with green tea and red bean paste, mochi, warabi mochi. There’s a Snoopy shop here as well. Traditional Japanese Snoopy goods. There’s Snoopy in the shape of sarubobo, the local not mascot. The local dolls. Good luck charms. This region’s known for woodwork. The lattices and wooden rooves withstand all teh snow in winter. It’s a mountainous region, so there’s a lot of snow. That’s nice, hearing that water. So green. You’d need big footsteps to walk down there. The last couple of times we’ve been to Japan have been in February and March, so it’s really nice to see the green at this time of year. Earlier in the year, before cherry blossom season, there isn’t much greenery around. The leaves aren’t out yet, and any grass that we saw was brown. It hadn’t started growing again yet. Down to the riverside. Go for a paddle. We’ve come down this other street of the old town, which also has shops and restaurants on it. Maybe not as many open as the other street, but there’s hardly anyone down here less crowded than the other street. It’s strange how everyone goes to the same places. This is the Takayama Traditional Culture and Crafts Square. and it’s free to go in. Let’s have a look. Quite a big square. Ah, they’re doing you wood carving till 3:00 And you can do sarubobo, braids, bamboo lamps and woodblock print lanterns. Look how quiet it is here. I wasn’t expecting this when I saw all the people with their suitcases at the station. You can make woodblock print lanterns. We really wanted to make the bamboo lanterns, but they’re just big for our suitcases. Here’s sarubobo. And you can make clothes for them as well. And this is traditional wood carving. This is a demonstration. It looks like he’s making a bird. Just opposite that it’s the Museum of History and Art, which is also free admission. On the east edge of the city, there’s a walking route called the Higashiyama Walking Course, that takes you past temples and shrines and the castle ruins. We didn’t have time for the whole course today, but we set off towards Shiroyama Park, where the castle ruins are. And all of this is still walkable from the station. There’s a sign to a sake brewery. I think there’s quite a lot of them around this area. We found this map of the Higashiyama walking course area map. and the complete walking course takes two hours. It’s 5.5km It’s quite a steep walk up to this castle ruins park. It’s only 300m, but it’s quite steep. It says: I’m not a bear. A Japanese serow. Still looks quite scary. There’s a cafe up here. Looks like they might be having some barbecue or something. Quite smoky. And then there’s various trails you can do around the Castle Ruins Park to get a view of the city or the Japanese Alps. I don’t think we’ll have time to do much of it right now, because I’ve got to go and have a meeting at our hotel. But, we’re going to have a quick look. Beware of bears. But that’s not a bear. We don’t know if we need to beware of this thing or not, or how big it is. It says bear attention. I think you’re supposed to hit this to scare the bears away or to get their attention. Beep beep beep. It’s very peaceful along here. Just us and the bears. Walking around Takayama, I can’t help thinking that these are the experiences that people probably want from Kyoto. Seeing historic buildings, old Japan, traditional Japan, lots of temples and shrines. You can see them all here and it’s much more peaceful and atmospheric. You don’t have to queue up for a long time. You’re not in a huge crowd of people, it’s worth coming if that’s the sort of Japan you want to see. Although I don’t know what it’s like here during a busier time. June isn’t really the off season, particularly, I’m sure it gets busier than this. For example, during cherry blossom season or during the holidays. Let’s ring that bell. Go away bears! Oh, that’s got quite a nice sound. It has! Some of them really clang, don’t they?! Look at this view of Takayama. This is just the road leading up to the castle ruins park. It’s nice seeing all those mountains in the background in different shades of fading into the distance. To give you an idea of the scale, we walked here from the station. And can you see that Hotel Around is the one we saw when we were at the station. The town isn’t huge. It didn’t take that long to walk this far. We’re just on the way back to the station. It’s a pretty street down here. more coming up from Takayama, including our hotel, which has fantastic views and amazing spa and saké vending machines. There’s also a restaurant round up with some of the best food I’ve had in Japan, and more things to do, including a day trip to Shirakawago. There’s new videos every Thursday, so make sure you’re subscribed. I’ll see

Takayama’s the place to go if you want to see historic, traditional Japan and beautiful countryside – it’s a great alternative to Kyoto!

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Takayama’s a small city in Gifu prefecture, in the mountainous Hida region. The area’s known for stunning countryside. You can get there in 2 hours 20 minutes from Nagoya (which is on the shinkansen line between Tokyo and Kyoto/Osaka), so it’s really easy to add to your Japan itinerary. The train ride there on the Hida Wide View Limited Express is scenic, with lovely views. See what it’s like arriving at Takayama Station and walking across the river to Sanmachi Suji, which is the old town. On the spur of the moment, we decided to try Japanese archery. The morning market was just closing (we’ll be back in another video!), so we tried street food around the old town, including Hida beef sushi, which is the local wagyu beef. Then we walk up towards Shiroyama Park, where the castle ruins are, and the Higashiyama Walking tour, which goes past temples and shrines. Takayama’s a lovely, chilled place to visit – the perfect contrast to Tokyo! There’s lots more coming up, including other things to do, restaurants (which were amazing!), a hotel review and day trips, including Hida Furukawa (visiting scenes from the anime Your Name) and Shirakawago.

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00:00 Train from Nagoya
06:05 Arriving in Takayama
09:33 Archery
11:16 Old town street food
16:54 Wander through Sanmachi Suji
19:28 Walking to Shiroyama Park

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