This article is based on a visit made on Saturday, 19 November 2016.
Edit 7 October 2019: Updated prices to reflect the increase in Japan's national sales tax.
Of the many castles across Japan, Himeji Castle (姫路城,
Himeji-jō) is the largest and most famous. It is identifiable by its massive white main keep, earning it nicknames such as the "white heron castle" (白鷺城,
Shirasagi-jō). It is one of only twelve that have remained standing since the feudal era without needing reconstruction. Despite having survived for over 400 years, the castle has nonetheless been renovated multiple times, most recently from 2010 to 2015, keeping it in pristine condition.
The castle is surrounded by a city of half a million inhabitants, who are linked to Japan's transportation network by the eponymous train station. It is a stop for the Sanyo Shinkansen as well as local lines, bringing Himeji within as little as 30 minutes from Osaka. The north entrance, shown, was also remodeled at around the same time as the castle in 2015.
The weather wasn't the greatest that day. While I missed most of the rain, the skies remained overcast. However, as if to make up for that, I got in for free! It turns out that Himeji Castle was participating in "Kansai Cultural Day", where hundreds of museums throughout the Kansai region were letting people in for free during the weekend. Perhaps all that luck the castle accrued over the years (see below) had rubbed off on me...!
A free park area surrounds the castle, but to get close to the actual buildings requires an entry fee, assuming they're charging one in the first place ;-). On the way up to the main keep, you will walk up a long, winding path, meant to wear down invaders. The walls are lined with holes for defenders to fire bows or guns through, uniquely shaped like rectangles, triangles, and circles. Other defences include "stone-drop windows", angled chutes along the walls of the main keep for defenders to drop stones or hot oil onto intruders.
The main keep is made up of six floors on the interior, and five on the exterior,
a common practise among Japanese castles. Just before you enter the keep, you can turn your head up and get a good look at the architecture underneath the roofs. The choice of colour was for more than aesthetic purposes, however -- the white plaster they used offered more resistance to fire damage.
The interior of the keep is sparely furnished, but has multiple exhibits about its construction, such as this scale-model of its inner framework. Signboards describing them are bilingually written in Japanese and English, and even more information may be bestowed upon you by using their augmented-reality app with your smartphone. (You might want to have a pocket Wi-Fi router handy for this, however.)
At the sixth and topmost floor, there are viewing windows and even a small shrine, because... it's Japan. Even Tokyo Tower has one of those, too.
The views from these sixth-floor windows are commanding. Once you head back down and exit the keep, you have the opportunity to explore the western sections of the castle, including a small courtyard and the western bailey (西の丸,
nishi no maru, pictured). The bailey contains additional museum space, much of it focused on the history of the castle and its various owners.
Himeji Castle did not always look as it does today. Various castles have stood in this spot since the 14th century, and this model in the west wing shows what one of the earlier keeps would have looked like. The current form dates back to the year 1609, and its construction was overseen by
Ikeda Terumasa (池田 輝政, 1565-1613), son-in-law of Tokugawa Ieyasu, one of Japan's unifying warlords. In fact, Ikeda was given the castle from Tokugawa as a reward for helping him win the
Battle of Sekigahara earlier in the decade. Since then, the castle has miraculously survived the demolition of other castles at the start of the Meiji Period, destruction by aerial bombing during World War II, and damage from the
Great Hanshin Earthquake in 1995.
Another historical figure who was prominently intertwined with Himeji Castle is known as
Princess Sen (千姫,
Sen-hime), the grand-daughter of Tokugawa Ieyasu. He raised her in Osaka Castle until it was sacked in 1615, but she was saved and moved to Himeji Castle. Afterwards she married the local feudal lord,
Honda Tadatoki, but he eventually died of tuberculosis. Upon this tragedy, Sen-hime spent the rest of her days as a Buddhist nun. These days, she is honoured by an official Sen-hime cosplayer, who lets the castle's visitors take their picture with her. My lucky streak that day continued: I was the last person to get in line for a picture before she took off for her lunch break!
Speaking of famous figures, the castle itself has been used as a filming location for domestic and foreign productions alike. Perhaps you might recognise it from the James Bond film
You Only Live Twice (1967), where the Japanese secret service set up a ninja training camp for 007. Or you might recall it from not one, but two movies directed by Akira Kurosawa:
Kagemusha (1980) and
Ran (1985). Or maybe from the TV series
Shogun (1980), where it doubled for Osaka Castle, because I presume the urban backdrop of contemporary Osaka would have been harder to edit out.
That's not to say Himeji Castle is the only reason to stop at this city. Just around the castle, there are a couple of museums, a zoo, and a landscape garden, the Koko-en (好古園,
Kōko-en, pictured). And farther afield, half an hour away by bus and cable-car, stands Mt. Shosha (書写山,
Shosha-zan) and the atmospheric Engyo-ji (円教寺,
Engyō-ji) temple. Alas, I chose not to go to those places, instead choosing to make a stopover on my way back to Osaka. Find out where, next time on Sekai Ichi!
Hours: Open from 9:00 AM to 5:00 PM, or to 6:00 PM from late April to August. Admission ends one hour before closing time. Closed on 29 and 30 December. During peak periods, such as cherry blossom season and Golden Week, a limited amount of numbered tickets will be available per day.
Costs: ¥1,000. A combined ticket for the castle and the Koko-en landscape garden costs ¥1,050.
Address: 68 Honmachi, Himeji-shi, Hyōgo-ken 〒670-0012
Access: From the north exit of Himeji Station, take a bus to the Himeji-jo Otemon-mae (姫路城大手門前) stop (5 minutes, ¥100). Buses that pass by the castle are marked on their stops' signboards, in both Japanese and English. When returning to Himeji Station, note that the stop for buses going in that direction is 500 metres to the left (facing away from the entrance), on the opposite side of the road.
Himeji Castle can also be reached on foot, in 15-20 minutes from the station. Simply walk up the main road from the station's north exit.
From Osaka, take the Sanyo Shinkansen from Shin-Osaka Station to Himeji (30-40 minutes, ¥3,810 reserved), or the JR Kobe Line
(A) from Osaka Station (65 minutes, ¥1,520). The Japan Rail Pass is valid on all of these routes, except for Nozomi and Mizuho Shinkansen trains.
Alternately, you can take the Hanshin Main Line*
(HS) to Sanyo-Himeji Station (SY43), located across the street from JR's Himeji Station, from Umeda Station in Osaka (95 minutes, ¥1,300). This method takes longer than using JR's lines, but is cheaper and fully covered by the Kansai Thru Pass.
*This line is operated as the Kobe Rapid Tozai Line between Motomachi and Nishidai, and the Sanyo Electric Railway Main Line
(SY) between Nishidai and Sanyo-Himeji. This is not to be confused with the Sanyo Main Line operated by JR West, although the two lines do run parallel to each other.
Website:
(English) (Japanese)
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