The ginkgo at Katsushika Hachimangu does not look like a single tree. The main trunk broke long ago, and what grew back is a dense uprising of branches from the base — a form that reads less as a tree than as a crowd, all reaching from the same root. The shrine itself has drawn warriors and farmers and poets across many centuries, and the city that grew up around it carries that layered quality into the present.
Ichikawa sits just across the Edogawa from Tokyo, close enough that the morning trains run packed, yet the residential streets behind the stations have a quietness that the commute does not suggest. The temple complex of Hokekyoji — a major center of the Nichiren sect — holds national treasures and important cultural properties within its grounds, and the approach is known for kinukatsugi, the small taro dumplings sold at stalls along the path. Nearby, the walking route called the Ichikawa Bungaku no Sanpomichi traces the neighborhoods where writers including Nagai Kafu and Koda Rohan once lived, maintained now by a local citizens' group rather than a tourism bureau.
Pears are still grown in Ichikawa, and flower cultivation continues alongside the suburban spread. The Kokubunji site marks where the provincial capital of Shimosa once stood, and the city's archaeology museum holds what that ground has given up. None of this announces itself loudly. The texture accumulates — a shrine, a temple path, a walking route, a stall selling steamed taro — in the way that places do when history has simply continued to be inhabited.
Where to stay
A day is rarely enough.
Booking through these links supports AURA at no extra cost to you.
What converges here
3 in this city. 208 within 25 km of the city hall.
- Chiba Museum of Science and Industry
- Museum of Wayo Women's University
- Municipal Museum of Natural History in Ichikawa
- Tobinodai Historic Site Park Museum
- Yamamoto-tei
See the nearest 25
- Edogawa-ku Local Museum
- Tojō Museum of History
- Urayasu City Folk Museum
- Tokyo Metro Museum
- Tachibana Taishō Minkaen (Former Koyama Residence)
- Katsushika City Museum
- Kochikame Museum
- Matsudo Museum
- Kiki's Museum of Literature
- Tobu Museum
- Mukōjima-Hyakkaen Garden
- Adachi City Museum
- Postal Museum Japan
- Center of the Tokyo Raids and War Damage
- Tobacco and Salt Museum
- Sumida Heritage Museum
- Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo
- Wood & Plywood Museum
- Tagawa Suiho・Norakuro Museum
- World Bags & Luggage Museum
- Great Kanto Earthquake Memorial Museum
- Arakawa Furusato Museum
- Sumida Hokusai Museum
- Edo-Tokyo Museum
- Japanese Sword Museum
Distances are straight-line from the municipal office. Each website was checked in September 2026. Some locations © OpenStreetMap contributors.
- Shimosa Kokubunji Temple Site and Kitashimo Tile Kiln Site
- Shimosa Kokubun-niji Temple Ruins
- Horinouchi Shell Mound
- Ubayama Shell Mound
- Soya Shell Mound
- Sembon Ginkgo Tree
- Hokekyo-ji Yotsuashi-mon Gate
- Hokekyoji Hokke-do
- Hokkekyo-ji Five-Story Pagoda
- Hokkekyo-ji Soshido
- Ichikawa
- Motoyawata
- Motoyawata
- Gyotoku
- Minami-Gyotoku
- Myoden
- Keisei-Yawata
- Ichikawa-Ono
- Ichikawa-Shiohama
- Kokubunji
- Futamatashimmachi
- Kitakokubu
- Ichikawa-Mama
- Onikoshi
- Sugano
- Omachi