Hamamatsu & Lake Hamana: Eel, Castles & Tea — 2 Days

The castle Tokugawa Ieyasu held in his rising years, from which he weathered a famous defeat at Mikatagahara before going on to unify Japan — for which it earned the nickname 'castle of success', a lucky stop for the career-minded. The compact reconstructed keep stands on a fine 'wild' stone base of rough, uncut boulders, with a small museum inside and a view over the city from the top, set in a green park of seasonal blossom. An easy, historically loaded first stop in the city centre.

Keep open ~08:30-16:30; admission about ¥200 (approx., 2026); the surrounding park is free. In central Hamamatsu, a short bus or taxi from Hamamatsu Station. Allow about an hour. The 'nozura-zumi' rough stone walls are worth a close look.

Hamamatsu is the eel capital of Japan, and Fujita, founded in 1892, is one of its long-standing specialists — eel split, skewered, steamed and grilled over charcoal, then lacquered in a sweet-savoury tare and served over rice as una-ju, or as the Nagoya-style hitsumabushi you eat three ways. The flesh is tender, the skin crisp at the edges, the tare deep from generations of topping up. This is the dish the whole region is built on, eaten at its source.

Open for lunch and dinner (hours vary by branch; the long-standing Hamamatsu store is at Komamochi); an una-ju or hitsumabushi runs roughly ¥3,000-6,000 (approx., 2026). Eel restaurants fill up — go early or expect a wait. Several other century-old specialists in town if it is full.

The free public-information museum of Japan's Air Self-Defense Force, on the edge of Hamamatsu air base, where retired fighter jets and a real Blue Impulse aerobatic aircraft fill a big hangar you can walk among, with cockpit displays, a flight simulator and an exhibition on the history of military aviation in Japan. It is genuinely fun and entirely free — a hit with children and anyone who likes aircraft — and an unexpected pleasure between the eel and the lake.

Open ~09:00-16:00, free; closed Mondays, the last Tuesday of the month and over mid-March. On the northwest side of Hamamatsu near the air base, ~15-20 minutes by car from the centre. The flight simulator can need advance sign-up on the day. Allow about 1.5 hours.

Lake Hamana is a large brackish lagoon open to the sea, ringed by the Kanzanji onsen district, and the most scenic way to take it in is the ropeway — the only lake-crossing cable car in Japan — which rises from the Pal Pal lakeside park over the water to Mount Okusa, where an observatory and a small organ museum look out over the lagoon to the Pacific. It is a relaxed late-afternoon ride, best near sunset, before settling into the lakeside for the night.

Round trip about ¥1,100 adult (approx., 2026), daytime hours; runs from the Pal Pal park in the Kanzanji area on the northeast shore. About 50 minutes by bus from Hamamatsu Station, or a short drive from the lake resorts. Best in clear late-afternoon light.

A large lakeside resort hotel on the southwest shore of Lake Hamana (formerly the Hamanako Royal), with hot-spring baths, lake-view rooms, a garden pool in season and broad water views — the most comfortable resort base on the lake. It makes an easy, relaxed end to the eel-and-aircraft day, with the lagoon at the door and dinner overlooking the water, and a convenient launch point for the inland tea-country drive the next morning.

Rates vary by season and room (2026) — confirm directly. On the southwest shore of Lake Hamana (Yuto). Ask for a lake-view room and the onsen plan. A car is the easiest way to reach it and to do the next day's inland route.

The ancestral temple of the Ii clan, the warrior family of Iinoya whose most famous head was the female lord Ii Naotora, tucked into the hills north of Hamamatsu. Its great draw is the pond garden behind the main hall, attributed to the master garden designer Kobori Enshu — a composition of clipped azaleas, moss and rock best viewed seated on the temple veranda, changing through the seasons. There is also a 'nightingale floor' that chirps underfoot. A serene, art-historical inland stop to open the day.

Open ~09:00-16:30; admission about ¥500 (approx., 2026); closed around August 15 and December 22-27. In Inasa (Iinoya), north of Hamamatsu, ~30-40 minutes by car from the lake. Sit on the veranda to view the garden properly. Allow about an hour.

One of the few castle keeps in Japan rebuilt in authentic wood rather than concrete — reconstructed in 1994 using traditional carpentry, with creaking timber stairs and the feel of the real thing, on the site of Yamauchi Kazutoyo's Edo-period castle. The neighbouring Ninomaru Goten, an original surviving palace hall, is an Important Cultural Property and arguably the more remarkable building, its tatami audience rooms intact. A satisfying, hands-on castle between the garden temple and the tea museum.

Open ~09:00-17:00; admission about ¥410 covering the keep and the Ninomaru Goten (approx., 2026). In Kakegawa, ~10 minutes from JR Kakegawa Station (a shinkansen stop), or by car from Iinoya. Allow about an hour for both buildings.

Shizuoka grows more green tea than any other prefecture, and this large museum at Shimada is the place to understand why — exhibits on tea's history and global culture, a hands-on hand-rolling experience, a tea-ceremony room in a garden designed in the Enshu style, and a restaurant and shop for tea-themed lunch and tasting. Set among the tea hills above the Oigawa, it turns the leaf you have been drinking all trip into something you can taste, roll and learn. A fitting midday stop in the heart of tea country.

Open ~09:00-17:00, closed Tuesdays; museum admission about ¥300, hand-rolling and tea-ceremony experiences extra (approx., 2026). At Kanaya in Shimada, ~20 minutes by car from Kakegawa. Restaurant on-site for lunch. Allow about 1.5 hours with a tasting.

A slender 90-metre suspension bridge strung high above a reservoir in the deep mountains of Sumata Gorge, whose water glows an unreal milky teal from suspended glacial-fine rock — the colour has made the 'dream suspension bridge' one of the most photographed spots in central Japan. The bridge sways, takes only ten people at a time, and is reached by a walking loop from the Sumatakyo onsen village through the gorge. Remote and spectacular, the deepest-inland point of the trip.

Open ~07:00-17:00; a small ~¥500 conservation fee may apply; the walking loop from the onsen village takes about 90 minutes round trip. Up the Oigawa valley in Kawanehon-cho, ~1.5 hours by car from the tea museum. Access by the Oigawa Railway is partly bus-substituted in 2026 — a car is the reliable way; check timetables. Wear proper shoes.