Takayama Customized Half-Day Tour with Licensed Local Guide

Sanmachi Street is a popular sightseeing area in Hida-Takayama. As an old town, the area has houses and stores from the Edo period (1603 - 1868). The area is lined with shops carrying local specialties such as Japanese sake, senbei (rice crackers), barbecue yakiniku Hida beef, and croquettes. The area has a lively atmosphere with people shopping and eating. Sanmachi Street is a five-minute walk from JR Takayama Station. Be sure to stop by when you visit Takayama.

Because of its valuable timber resources, the Hida Region around Takayama was put under direct control of the Tokugawa Shogunate in 1692. The Takayama Jinya (高山陣屋) served as the local government office headed by the officials dispatched from Edo (present day Tokyo). The building complex was in official use until 1969, and is now open to the public as a museum. It includes various nicely maintained tatami mat rooms that once served as offices, conference rooms, guest rooms and residential space. There is also an interesting interrogation room. Beside the main building stands a large storehouse built in the 1600s. Known as the biggest traditional rice storehouse in Japan, it now functions as a museum, showcasing belongings and official documents of past feudal lords, old maps of the Hida Region and historic town plans. Admission 440 yen

■Hida Takayama Art and Festa Forest Matsuri no Mori (Festival Forest Museum) offers a glimpse into the vibrant world of Takayama’s famous festivals. The museum features full-sized replica floats (yatai), richly decorated with gold leaf and lacquer, as well as mechanical karakuri dolls that perform traditional dances in a dramatic underground hall. In addition to the festival exhibits, visitors can explore a nature museum with a global insect collection and meet cute animals like squirrels and rabbits. There is also a peaceful tea house and a small art gallery on-site(10min walk from Matsuri no Mori). Blending culture, nature, and local charm, Matsuri no Mori is an enjoyable stop for visitors of all ages.

The Higashiyama Walking Course (東山遊歩道, Higashiyama Yūhodō) is a pleasant walking route through Takayama's temple town (Teramachi), the city's rural "suburbs" and Shiroyama Park, a wooded hill and former site of Takayama Castle. Along the 3.5 kilometer long course, you will pass more than a dozen common temples and shrines, the ruins of Takayama's former castle and ordinary scenes of a rural Japanese town. While the Higashiyama Walking Course is by no means a stunning sightseeing experience, it offers a pleasant way to spend one or two hours and get to know Takayama's calmer side.

Takayama Festival Floats Exhibition Hall(高山祭屋台会館). The Takayama Festival, held in spring (April 14 and 15) and autumn (October 9 and 10), is ranked as one of Japan's three most beautiful festivals (the other two are Kyoto's Gion Matsuri and the Chichibu Matsuri). Four of the autumn festival's eleven floats (yatai) are exhibited at the Takayama Matsuri Yatai Kaikan (高山祭屋台会館), a hall next to Sakurayama Hachiman Shrine. The elaborately decorated floats are several hundred years old and beautiful examples of Takayama's legendary craftsmanship. Adjacent to the Matsuri Yatai Kaikan lies the Nikkokan, a spacious hall containing impressive models of the different precincts of Toshogu Shrine in Nikko, one of the most ornate and celebrated shrines in the country. The miniature models are beautifully intricate and are accompanied by short explanations in Japanese and English. Photos are permitted inside both halls.

Two morning markets (朝市, Asaichi) are held in Takayama on a daily basis from around 7:00 (8:00 in winter) to noon: the Miyagawa Market along the Miyagawa River in the old town, and the Jinya-mae Market in front of the Takayama Jinya. The stands sell local crafts, snacks and farm products such as vegetables, pickles and flowers. There is typically a pleasant atmosphere around the markets, as tourists and locals alike saunter from stall to stall purchasing goods and food and talking.

Hida Kokubunji Temple, about a five-minute walk from JR Takayama Station, is a well-known Buddhist temple in Takayama. Its iconic three-storied pagoda was constructed in 1820. A Buddhist statue thought to have been made in the Heian period is enshrined in the main building. Be sure to take notice of the huge gingko tree on the grounds. It is over 1,260 years of age.

Sakurayama Hachimangu Shrine in Takayama is the venue for the Takayama Festival in the autumn. Next to the shrine is the Takayama Festival Floats Exhibition Hall, or Yatai Kaikan, where four of the actual floats used in the festival are on display. The shrine is 15 minutes by Machinami Bus (clockwise) or a 20 minute walk from JR Takayama Station.

The Kusakabe Folk Museum is a historic private residence that was opened to the public. The building was constructed during the Meiji period in Edo architectural style. It is due to its splendid architectural technique, the entire building is designated as an Important Cultural Property of Japan. The museum is thirteen minutes by Machinami Bus (counterclockwise) or a fifteen-minute walk from JR Takayama Station.

Yoshijima Heritage House was built in Meiji 41 (1908). Because it has been a Sake brewery since olden times, a huge sakabayashi (sign of a shop dealing in sake, made of Japanese ceder leaves) is hung under the eaves. In contrast to the masculine style of the Kusakabe house, it can be said that this Yoshijima house is a structure possessing subtlety and feminine beauty.

Takayama Showa-kan Museum, The retro streets of 1950 are reconstructed inside the museum, and the lifestyle and culture of that time period are nostalgically revived. There is Midget Alley, a barbershop, a photo studio and a general store. Many nostalgic items are on display, and visitors can see and feel the good old days.

There is old good atmosphere with a set of Showa movies at Hida Takayama retro museum. You can actually “See it”,“Snap it” and “Play it” a figure, magazine, poster, toy, game, showa retro pachinko, etc. It is an experience-type of museum that you can feel the life and culture of Showa.

Hida Folk Village (飛騨の里, Hida no Sato) is an open air museum exhibiting over 30 traditional houses from the Hida region, the mountainous district of Gifu Prefecture around Takayama. The houses were built during the Edo Period (1603 - 1867) and were relocated from their original locations to create the museum in 1971. In a village-like atmosphere, the museum features buildings such as the former village head's house, logging huts, storehouses and a number of gassho-zukuri farmhouses. These massive farmhouses are named after their steep thatched roofs which resemble a pair of hands joined in prayer ("gassho"). They were moved here from nearby Shirakawago, where gassho-zukuri houses are the reason for the region's World Heritage status. Admission 700 yen (parking: 300 yen)