Matsumoto travel guide

Top 10 sights in Matsumoto

Ranked by Wikipedia language editions — proven fame.

1. 

   1© 663highland · CC BY 2.5

   Matsumoto Castle

   One of Japan's four castles designated National Treasures, and the oldest surviving five-tier keep, finished in the 1590s. It is black rather than white, stands in its moat with the Alps behind, and the interior stairs are as steep and unmodified as they were built.

   TiqetsKlook
2. 

   2© 663highland · CC BY-SA 4.0

   Former Kaichi School

   A school in Matsumoto opened in 1873 and moved into this building in 1876, built by local carpenters imitating Western style from photographs. In 2019 it became the first modern school building in Japan to be made a national treasure.

   TiqetsKlook
3. 

   3

   Japan Ukiyo-e Museum

   A private museum outside Matsumoto holding the Sakai family's collection of some hundred thousand ukiyo-e — the largest in the world, assembled over five generations by merchants of this town. Only a fraction hangs at a time, on rotation, because the paper cannot take the light.

   TiqetsKlook
4. 

   4© 663highland · CC BY-SA 4.0

   Utsukushi-ga-hara Open-Air Museum

   An open-air sculpture museum on the Utsukushigahara plateau at 2,000 metres in Nagano prefecture, Japan. Opened in 1981, it sets some 350 modern sculptures from Japan and abroad across four hectares, with views of the Japanese Alps and Mount Fuji.

   TiqetsKlook
5. 

   5

   Jōkyō Gimin Memorial Museum

   A memorial museum at Azumino in Nagano prefecture in Japan. It deals with the Jōkyō uprising of 1686 in the Azumi plain, also called the Kasuke rebellion after Tada Kasuke, who led the peasants.

   TiqetsKlook
6. 

   6© 深志 · CC BY-SA 3.0

   Matsumoto City Museum of Archaeology

   An archaeological museum opened at Matsumoto in Nagano prefecture in 1986. It displays Jōmon pottery, the clay tablet from the Erianna site, and the haji ware, weapons, bronze mirrors and glass beads from the Kōbōyama mound.

   TiqetsKlook
7. 

   7© 663highland · CC BY 2.5

   Hotaka Shrine

   A Shinto shrine in Hotaka, Azumino, Nagano prefecture, Japan. It was the third shrine of Shinano province and a former national shrine, and is now a specially listed shrine of the Association of Shinto Shrines.

   TiqetsKlook
8. 

   8© photo: Qurren (talk) Taken with Canon IXY 10S · CC BY-SA 3.0

   Hiraide ruins

   A site at Soga in Shiojiri in Nagano prefecture. It was a settlement occupied continuously from the early Jōmon to the early Heian period, and was made a national historic site in 1952.

   TiqetsKlook
9. 

   9© 深志 at Japanese Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 3.0

   Kōbōyama Kofun

   A large burial mound at Nakayama in Matsumoto in Nagano prefecture, designated a national historic site in 1976.

   TiqetsKlook
10. 

    10

    Hayashi Castle

    A mountain castle that stood at Matsumoto in Nagano prefecture. The Ogasawara clan, who governed the region in the Muromachi period, built it as the seat of the shugo of Shinano, and it was made a national historic site in 2017 together with the Igawa castle site.

    TiqetsKlook

Popular tickets & tours in Matsumoto

Live products and prices are provided directly by Klook.

KlookOpen Matsumoto activitiesBrowse tickets & toursKKdayOpen Matsumoto activitiesBrowse tickets & tours