Chofu Fireworks is Tokyo’s late-September hanabi — about 10,000 shells over an hour on the Tamagawa riverbank, with music-synced Hanabillusion sequences. Here’s how to get there on the Keio Line, where to watch, and how to pair it with a daytime trip to Jindaiji Temple.
Most tourists only photograph Nijubashi from across the moat. The Imperial Palace East Gardens are actually open four days a week for free, there is a free Imperial Household Agency tour into the inner palace, and Chidorigafuchi beats Ueno for quiet cherry blossoms. Here is how to do it properly.
The wholesale market moved to Toyosu in 2018, but the Tsukiji Outer Market stayed — 400 shops, sushi breakfasts, tamago-yaki skewers and the best kitchen knife shopping in Tokyo. Here is how to do it properly.
Tokyo’s three train operators, the IC card that works on all of them, how to read the station codes, and why Google Maps beats every transit app going. A first-timer’s guide to Tokyo trains and the Suica card.
Ginza is a 400-year-old specialised-commerce district, not a post-war invention. A practical guide to the Wako clock tower, single-act kabuki tickets, weekend pedestrian paradise, and how to eat well here without remortgaging.
The real first-timer guide to Shinjuku: how to survive the world’s busiest station, the free skyline view at the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building, and which bits of Kabukicho, Omoide Yokocho and Golden Gai are worth your night.
A friendly guide to Tokyo for first-timers — written by someone who remembers exactly what it felt like to walk out of Shinjuku Station for the first time.