Travel Japan – Visit Kanto
The Kantō (関東) region of Japan, on the eastern side of the main island Honshu, is a broad plain dominated by and nearly synonymous with the megalopolis of Tokyo and its suburbs.
Generalities
In feudal times, Kanto was the home of the Tokugawa shogunate and Edo (modern Tokyo) the military seat of power, while the western region of Kansai represented commerce (Osaka) and culture (Kyoto). But the pendulum shifted decisively in Tokyo’s favor after the 1869 Meiji Restoration when the Emperor moved to Tokyo, and today Kanto sets the pace that the rest of Japan tries to follow.
Prefectures
- Chiba — suburban sprawl to the east and the site of Narita of airport fame
- Gunma — mountains and hot springs to the north of Tokyo
- Ibaraki — coastal prefecture containing the hometown of natto, Mito
- Kanagawa — suburban sprawl to the south containing Yokohama, Japan’s second largest city, and Kawasaki
- Saitama — suburban sprawl to the north containing very little
- Tochigi — popular escape known for historical site Nikko and many hot springs
- Tokyo — the largest city in the world
- Yamanashi — at the foothills of Mount Fuji
Cities
- Chiba — another Tokyo offshoot to the east
- Kawasaki — suburb sandwiched between Tokyo and Yokohama
- Tokyo — capital of Japan, largest city in the world
- Yokohama — officially Japan’s 2nd largest city, in practice a giant Tokyo suburb
National parks
- Chichibu-Tama National Park — mountain hiking within easy striking distance of Tokyo
- Fuji-Hakone-Izu National Park — for hot springs and views of Fuji
Other attractions
- Atami — coastal hot spring resort a short Shinkansen hop from Tokyo
- Enoshima — Japan’s surfing paradise in style and attitude (a shame there isn’t much in the way of waves)
- Kamakura — temple town within easy striking distance of Tokyo
- Kinugawa — former hot spring boomtown fallen on hard times
- Mount Fuji — although it’s in neighboring Chubu, the tallest mountain in Japan is accessible from Tokyo
- Nikko — the grandiose mausoleum of the Tokugawa shoguns
Get in
Most visitors arrive in the Kanto region via Tokyo, and most of those arrive via Narita Airport, Japan’s main international gateway.
Talk
The Kanto dialect is the base of the standard Japanese taught in schools and spoken on TV.
Eat
Compared with their western cousins in Kansai, the people of Kanto prefer dark soy to light soy, thin buckwheat soba noodles to fat wheat udon and think that the odoriferous fermented bean product natto is actually edible.
(Source: Wikitravel)
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