Tsuyama

Chugoku, Japan · Town / small city, Countryside / satoyama

The capital of old Mimasaka, which foreign tourism does not set foot in and Japanese tourism does. Of the castle Mori Tadamasa took twelve years to build and that was dismantled entirely in 1873 not one original building remains, but the walls do, up to forty-five metres of them, and in April they fill with cherry blossom. On either side of the castle are two quarters the state protects separately: to the east the merchants' one on the Izumo road, to the west the temple one. And an oddity that fits with none of the above: this was the city of Western learning, the one that produced the Udagawa and the Mitsukuri, the physicians who translated the first treatise on internal medicine and the first on chemistry published in Japan, and it has the country's only museum devoted to that. By the station there is also a locomotive roundhouse from 1936. Half an hour west, up the Asahi river, is Katsuyama with ninety painted curtains hanging from its houses, and further up an open-air hot bath in the riverbed itself, free and open at any hour.

The essentials

Getting there

Train + bus — Tsuyama is a railway junction come down in the world, but still a junction: the Tsuyama line from Okayama, the Kishin from Himeji to Tottori and the Inbi towards Chizu all pass through. From Okayama is the logical way in. The centre is walkable: ten minutes on foot from the station to the castle, twenty-five to the Western-learning museum, and the Gongon loop bus to the Joto quarter. Outside town is another matter. Katsuyama is on the Kishin line, Chugoku-Katsuyama station and five minutes' walk, but the train no longer reaches Yubara: from Katsuyama there is a district bus, and the prefecture itself reckons about three hours from Okayama that way excluding waits, against an hour and ten by car. For the Maniwa side, drive. In winter inland Okayama gets snow and the mountain roads want proper tyres.

Frequently asked questions about Tsuyama

What to do in Tsuyama: 11 activities

• Joto, the merchants' quarter 1.5 h must-see

  Eight point one hectares on the left bank of the Miyagawa, east of the castle, protected by the state since 7 August 2013 under the category of merchant town. The dossier says what to look at: the early Edo plot division survives almost intact, and the houses facing the old Izumo road are gabled with the entrance on the long side and a low half-storey, the tsushi-nikai, with projecting lattice windows, barred insect-cage windows, walls of square tiles with raised jointing and wind-break side walls. Three places let you in: the Kajimura house, an Edo merchant's dwelling; the Sakushu Joto residence, with its fire lookout tower, which after 1875 was a primary school and later a technical college; and the birthplace of Mitsukuri Genpo. From the station the Gongon loop bus drops you at the door.

• The bath in the riverbed, free and at any hour 1.5 h must-see Yubara, Maniwa · 65 min

  At the foot of the Yubara dam, in the bed of the Asahi river itself, hot water rises from the bottom lifting sand with it, which is where the name comes from. There is no building, no ticket desk and no opening time: it is free and open twenty-four hours, and the neighbourhood keeps it. Three pools at different temperatures, each with its own name, the one for beauty, the one for children and the one for long life. Alkaline simple water, colourless. It is a mixed bath, and it is worth knowing how it is done: swimsuits and a towel wrapped round the body are allowed, and for women there is an opaque bathing garment — developed with Wacoal, according to the prefecture — to rent or buy; what is not allowed is underwear. Wednesday mornings it closes for cleaning. It sits in the national ranking of open-air baths as yokozuna of the west, the top rank on its side. From Tsuyama you drive, or chain a train to Katsuyama with a district bus.

• The walls of Tsuyama castle 2 h must-see

  Mori Tadamasa, the domain's first lord, took twelve years over it and finished it in 1616. In 1873 it was dismantled entirely, down to the last building, and what remains is what you come for: the stone walls, which the prefectural tourism federation says reach forty-five metres. It is one of Japan's Hundred Castles. The only thing rebuilt is the Bitchu-yagura, in 2005, for the four-hundredth anniversary: the largest turret of the complex, its rooms laid with tatami in palace style, and free to enter. Two figures the sources do not agree on: the park costs ¥300 from age 16 according to the city and ¥310 from high-school age according to the prefecture, with children free. It opens at 8:40 and closes between 17:00 and 19:00 depending on the month; 29 to 31 December it does not open. Ten minutes on foot from the station.

• Cherry blossom over the stone 2 h only blossom in early-to-mid April; the festival from late March to mid-April

  Kakuzan park, which is the castle enclosure, is on the list of Japan's hundred best cherry-blossom places. How many trees there are depends who you ask: the city says several thousand and the prefectural tourism federation says about a thousand, which is a wide margin for counting trees. Blossom runs from early to mid-April. During the festival the park extends its hours to 7:30-22:00, with the cherries lit up over the walls, which is the reason to come at night. The dates do not match either: the city talks about 1 to 15 April in general and the prefecture published 28 March to 12 April for 2026. Worth checking the year's dates before building a trip around it.

• Josai, the temple quarter 1.5 h

  On the other side of the castle there is a second protected quarter, which is unusual in a city this size: Josai joined the national list in 2020, seven years after Joto. Its character is different. What sets the tone here is Nishi-teramachi, the row of temples along the old Izumo road, and the houses are not only Edo but Taisho and Showa too. Two buildings in particular: the Sakushu folk-craft museum, the former Doi bank of 1909 converted, with the district's toys and trades; and Tokumori shrine, which tradition dates to the year 733, burned in 1539 and was rebuilt, and which Mori Tadamasa made the castle town's guardian shrine when he built the castle. Twenty minutes on foot from the station. There are guided walks that take in both quarters.

• Katsuyama and its ninety curtains 2 h Katsuyama, Maniwa · 40 min

  Half an hour west, up the Asahi river, a village of wooden houses where almost every doorway hangs a hand-painted cloth curtain: about ninety of them, according to Maniwa city, and not generic tourist decoration but dyed with plant dyes in a workshop in the village itself. One thing many guides get wrong is worth being precise about: Katsuyama is not a state-protected district like Tsuyama's two, but the first one Okayama prefecture designated, in 1985. It was a castle town and also the highest landing on the river, the point flat-bottomed boats could reach, and some seven hundred metres of those landings survive along the bank. Five minutes on foot from Chugoku-Katsuyama station.

• The 1936 locomotive roundhouse 1.5 h

  Beside the station stands a fan-shaped engine shed, built in 1936 when the Kishin line fully opened, with its turntable in front. JR West raised it to the rank of railway monument on 14 October 2018, Railway Day, promoting it from registered railway cultural property; before that, in 2016, it had opened it as a museum together with the city. According to the prefectural tourism federation it is the second largest of those still standing in Japan. Inside there are carriages and locomotives, among them the DE50-1 diesel, of which exactly one was ever built in the country. Three hundred and ten yen for adults and a hundred for schoolchildren, free below school age; 9:00 to 16:00 with last entry at 15:30, closed Mondays and 29 to 31 December. Ten minutes on foot from the station.

• The only museum of Western learning 1.5 h

  This is what you do not expect from an inland Okayama city. From the end of the Edo period into early Meiji, the Mimasaka district produced two lineages of scholars who studied the West and who lie behind much of Japanese scientific vocabulary: the Udagawa and the Mitsukuri. The museum, which presents itself as Japan's only one devoted to yogaku, lays that out in three chronological rooms plus a temporary one, and in them are the Kaitai Shinsho, the anatomy treatise that appears in every textbook, the Seisetsu Naika Senyo, the first book of Western internal medicine published in Japan, and the Seimi Kaiso, the first of chemistry. Three hundred yen general admission, ¥200 students and over-65s, free up to junior high. Open 9:00 to 17:00 with last entry at 16:30, closed Mondays, the day after public holidays and 29 December to 3 January.

• The 1804 brewery on the street of curtains 1.5 h Katsuyama, Maniwa · 40 min

  Tsuji Honten has been making sake on the same spot in Katsuyama since 1804. The brand's name comes from that: the Mimasaka Katsuyama domain took it as tribute sake and gave it the name gozenshu, the sake of the lord's table. What a passing visitor can see: the mid-Meiji storehouse converted into Nishikura, with the Sumiya shop below and a dining room above; the main building and Nishikura have been listed as registered cultural properties since November 2013. The shop opens 10:00 to 17:00 and the dining room 11:00 to 14:30, with the closing days changed from May 2026, so it is worth checking. Lunch sets run ¥2,200 to ¥3,000, the latter by reservation. One figure from the house itself: since 2023 it makes all its sake with Omachi rice from Okayama.

• The house where Mitsukuri Genpo was born 0.75 h

  Inside the Joto quarter stands the birthplace of Mitsukuri Genpo, who became a Tsuyama domain physician at twenty-one and ended up one of the country's reference translators. It is a twenty-minute visit and it makes sense right after the Western-learning museum, because it explains the same thing from the other side: not the case of books but the house of a provincial doctor that part of it came out of.

• The March dolls in Katsuyama 2 h Katsuyama, Maniwa · 40 min only late February to 3 March; in 2026 it was from 27 February to 3 March

  For a few days at the end of February and the start of March, the village brings out its hinamatsuri doll sets and puts them on show: about a hundred and sixty houses, according to Maniwa city, open the entrance hall or the window so they can be seen from the street. The village brewery mounts its own display as well. In 2026 it ran from 27 February to 3 March. It is the same street as the curtains, in winter and with something else hanging: if the date can be chosen, this week and Tsuyama's cherry blossom in April are the two good ones of the year.

What only happens on specific dates

• The March dolls in Katsuyama late February to 3 March; in 2026 it was from 27 February to 3 March
• Cherry blossom over the stone blossom in early-to-mid April; the festival from late March to mid-April

Chains well with

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