Wild Tokyo: Forest Shrines, Garden Ponds and the Mountains Beyond

The natural side of Tokyo, from the planted forest of Meiji Jingū and the gardens of Shinjuku Gyoen, Rikugien and Hama-rikyu to the birds of the city and the mountain lakes and cedar forests of Hakone and Nikkō, with a directory of the parks and day trips in our guide.

Tokyo is the most built-up place you are likely to visit, and yet green is never far away. Meiji Jingū stands in a forest planted by hand when the shrine was built; the great gardens of the Edo period keep their ponds, islands and old trees; and within two hours by train the lakes of Hakone and the cedar forests of Nikkō open out under the mountains.

This is a short, honest guide to Tokyo’s natural side: the forest and the gardens of the city, the birds you will see in them, and the mountain landscapes within a day’s reach. Go early, when the gardens are quiet, and carry water in summer.

In the middle of the world’s largest city, a forest planted a century ago has grown into woodland.

A forest in the city

The forest around Meiji Jingū was planted when the shrine was built, with trees given from across Japan, and it has grown into deep woodland between Harajuku and Yoyogi (meijijingu.or.jp). The wide gravel paths under the trees are among the coolest places in the city on a summer morning. Next door, Yoyogi Park’s ginkgo and zelkova turn gold in late autumn.

The great gardens

Shinjuku Gyoen, a national garden, has three gardens in one, Japanese, English and French, with great lawns, old pines and ponds (Ministry of the Environment). The Edo-period stroll gardens are smaller and more intimate: Rikugien’s pond and hills, Koishikawa Kōrakuen’s plum trees and moon bridge, Kiyosumi’s stepping stones, and Hama-rikyu, where the pond rises and falls with the tide of Tokyo Bay.

The birds of the city

Tokyo’s most visible wild residents are its crows, large jungle crows that patrol the parks and the rooftops. In February and March, when the plum trees flower in the gardens, look for the Japanese white-eye, a small olive-green bird with a white ring around its eye, feeding on the blossom. The garden ponds draw herons and ducks, and in winter migrant ducks gather on Shinobazu Pond in Ueno Park.

Mountains within a day

South-west of the city, Hakone is a hot-spring resort in volcanic hills, with Lake Ashi in an old crater and the steaming valley of Ōwakudani above it; on clear days Mount Fuji, inscribed by UNESCO in 2013, rises beyond. North of Tokyo, the shrines of Nikkō stand in a forest of tall cedars, part of a UNESCO World Heritage site since 1999, with Lake Chūzenji and the Kegon Falls higher up.

Feature: the seasons in the gardens

Tokyo’s gardens are planted for the seasons. Plum blossom comes first, in February and March; then the cherry trees, usually from late March into early April; azaleas in April and May, irises in June; and the maples and ginkgo turn from mid-November into early December, when several gardens open in the evening for illuminations.

Did you know? Hama-rikyu’s pond is fed by seawater from Tokyo Bay, so its level rises and falls with the tide.

Our advice

Our advice: walk Meiji Jingū’s forest path when the gates open, visit one stroll garden in the season of its flowers, and give Hakone or Nikkō a full day, starting early; carry water in summer, and keep to the paths in the gardens.