Tohoku, Japan · City
The birthplace of the Nebuta Festival (giant illuminated floats) and home to Japan's most famous apples.
Train — Tohoku Shinkansen to the northern tip of Honshu
A nighttime parade of enormous paper lanterns and dancers held from August 2 to 7.
A museum known for Yoshitomo Nara's giant sculpture Aomori-ken and works by Marc Chagall.
Giant lanterns from the Nebuta Festival on display year-round.
A market where you build your own bowl of rice topped with fresh seafood chosen stall by stall — the famous nokkedon.
Aomori produces a large share of Japan's apples.
A scenic ropeway up a volcanic mountain range, spectacular in autumn and home to 'snow monsters' in winter.
A historic onsen more than 300 years old on the same road that climbs to Hakkoda, famous for its 'Sennin-buro' or thousand-person bath, designated a National Health Resort Onsen.
A complex next to the station with a small apple cider works and shops selling local products, proper retail beyond the seafood markets.
A family snow area inside the Aomori Sports Park, with tubing, 'snow rafting' and snowmobiles, within the city itself.
A professional B.League basketball team playing at the Aoimori Arena, with a good atmosphere in the stands and affordable tickets.
An aquarium open since 1924 next to the Asamushi hot-spring town, with Japanese giant salamanders, dolphins and an underwater tunnel.
A coastal hot-spring town within Aomori city itself, with waters known since the 12th century and visited even by the Meiji Emperor in 1876.
A triangular building beside the port with a local produce shop, a 3D film about the Nebuta festival and demonstrations of kogin-zashi (traditional embroidery), a panoramic observation deck on the 13th floor and the Aoiumi Park promenade right alongside.
An underground market for fresh produce and seafood in the heart of Aomori city.
Internationally recognised ungroomed powder terrain, reached by ropeway and guided by local backcountry operators.
A route of about 11.6 km from the top of the ropeway down to Sukayu Onsen, crossing mountain wetlands and alpine flora, very different from the simple scenic ride up by ropeway.
A former rail ferry that crossed the Tsugaru Strait to Hakodate before the Seikan Tunnel (1988), moored in the port as a museum: you walk the bridge, the cabins and the wagon deck where the trains were loaded.
A museum devoted to the Aomori-born printmaker Shiko Munakata, a Person of Cultural Merit, in a traditional 'azekura' style building; it complements the Aomori Museum of Art with a local figure less known outside Japan.
One of the largest Jomon-period settlements discovered in Japan.
A late-January festival next to the Wa Rasse museum with hundreds of small lit snow lanterns, a quiet winter counterpoint to the boisterous summer Nebuta.
A district of Buddhist temples next to the centre (Joko-ji, Shogaku-ji, Renshin-ji and Renge-ji), with traditional architecture and a quiet atmosphere, with almost no foreign tourism.
A small Shinto shrine whose red facade stands out strikingly against the snow, with a contemplative garden and an unusual 'grave for kitchen knives' where chefs retire their tools.
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