A beautiful bamboo trail tucked in this famous Japanese Shrine.

This 700-year-old street food market features baby octopus and soy donuts.

A tiny collection of traditional Japanese woodblock prints, open only when the owner feels like it.

With over 12,000 different species of plants, this botanical garden is Japan's oldest and most diverse.

A Japanese cat island also populated by the descendants of a band of banished samurai.

This pair of small sea rocks has been "wed" using rope and ancient Shinto tradition.

Giant animal sculptures are created with the rice straw leftover from the fall harvest each year.

Cherry blossom season comes early in this Japanese town where pink flowers line the streets and riverbanks.

A real-life replica of a home from Hayao Miyazaki's beloved movie "My Neighbor Totoro."

The world's shortest escalator doesn't seem to have any reason to exist other than to hold a world record.

The small candy-colored ride is the last rooftop Ferris wheel in Tokyo.

A 70-foot-deep ice cave formed by lava from Mt. Fuji on the edge of Japan's "Suicide Forest." 

A beautiful, dense forest in the shadow of Mount Fuji, with a tragic reputation.

After being lost for decades, this striking mural depicting the atomic bomb covers the wall of a busy Tokyo metro station.

An unexpected curiosity cabinet hidden within a department store in the Japan Post tower.

This Buddhist temple is home to the graves of the Japanese national legends, the 47 Ronin.

If Hello Kitty were Mickey Mouse, this would be Disneyland.

The original "capsule building" is a masterpiece of Metabolist architecture.

Tokyo’s only Vaudeville-cuckoo clock–steampunk-Victorian curio cabinet time piece.

A Japanese concept restaurant that feels like a party thrown by the monsters in your closet.

A 20-meter (65-foot) robot towers over Tokyo Bay.

The bartenders at this crime-fighting theme cafe are actual private detectives by day.

The freshest fish here are the ones you catch yourself.

The legendary birthplace of the Japanese maneki-neko is dotted with hundreds of lucky beckoning cats.