Nikko
Japan
A shogun’s mausoleum buried in cedar forest, with waterfalls and a marshland plateau above it
Photos by Julius Yls, Denise Metz, Deepavali Gaind and Susann Schuster on Unsplash
Best time to visit all of Japan
October for the leaves, and May to June — the high season weekends jam the one road up to the lake
Climate month by month
The next sixteen daysOpen-Meteo
Average high and low · °C
Rainfall · mm per month
Best months to visit This month · wettest 315mm in Aug
Where it is
36.75°N, 139.60°E Open in Google Maps
Things to do
Weeks of it- Get to Toshogu at opening and beat the coaches
- Walk part of the cedar avenue rather than photographing it from the bus
- Take the bus up the hairpins to Lake Chuzenji
- Boardwalk across Senjogahara with nobody else on it
- Soak at Yumoto onsen at the top of the road
Nikko travel tipsthe general rules
Currency budget Japan
Mid-rangeCash still matters more than anywhere else this rich — small restaurants, shrines and buses are coins and notes. Seven Bank machines in 7-Eleven take every foreign card, and Japan Post machines are the backup.
ATMs & cards
Use the machines in 7-Eleven (Seven Bank) or at the post office. Bank machines in Japan often refuse foreign cards and many shut overnight, which surprises people who expect a rich country to be a card country.
Avoid these
- bank machines without a Global or International sign, which refuse foreign cards
Use these instead
- 7-Eleven (Seven Bank)
- Japan Post
- Lawson and FamilyMart machines
Japan is still a cash country in the places worth eating at. Seven Bank machines in any 7-Eleven take every foreign card, at any hour. Draw before going up to Chuzenji; the lake road has almost nothing.
Wherever you are: if the machine offers to charge you in your home currency, decline. That is dynamic currency conversion and the rate is set by the ATM's operator, not your bank.
Safety all of Japan
Very safeVery safe. Autumn weekends bring traffic that turns a 40-minute bus into two hours, the Irohazaka road ices from late in the year, and bears live on the plateau — the bells on hiking packs are there for a reason.
Where to walk, and where to pay attention (7 areas)
Comfortable, including after dark
Worth more attention
- the Irohazaka hairpins in ice — they freeze early and the buses queue nose to tail in the leaf weeks
- the marshes and forest above the lake — bears live here, which is what the bells on hiking packs are for
- the last bus down — it is earlier than people expect and the taxi from the lake is expensive
Very safe. Plan around the autumn traffic, which turns a forty-minute bus into two hours..
Our own assessment, not a sourced index.
Entry & visa Japan visa rules
No visa neededup to 90 days
A pre-travel electronic authorisation (JESTA) is being introduced — check the official link for whether it applies to your dates.
Other passports
Visa required in advance
How to get it: Nothing to arrange for visa-free entry. Use the Visit Japan Web service to pre-file immigration and customs and skip the paper forms.
Entry rules change often and depend on your passport, not where you live — the official page above is the authority, and the airline checks before you board.
Before you fly: the arrival card
Visit Japan WebOptional
Any time before you fly. Register the account early; the trip details can wait.
Have these in front of you before you start:
- passport
- flight number
- the full address of your first night
Not compulsory, but immigration and customs both have a QR lane for it and the other queue is long.
Use the official link above. Sites that charge a "service fee" to submit one of these for you are not the government, and they want the same passport details the real form does.
Health & emergencies all of Japan
Good and affordableRequired to enter
No vaccinations are required for entry from Europe or North America.
Jabs worth having, and what happens if you need a doctor
Worth having
- Routine vaccinations up to date
- Japanese encephalitis only for long rural stays in summer
Getting treated
Superb, and ambulances are free. Treatment is not: visitors pay in full up front, and hospitals routinely refuse cards, so carry cash and real insurance. Finding English-speaking staff outside major cities is the harder problem — the JNTO medical directory is worth bookmarking before you go.
Orientation, not medical advice — entry rules change and what you need depends on your own history. Check with a travel clinic four to six weeks before you go.
Food tip
GoodYuba — tofu skin, lifted off the vat in sheets — is the local speciality and turns up in everything from sashimi to soup. The shrine-town restaurants close early, which catches out anybody planning a late dinner.
Getting around
Easy- UberWorks here
- GOWorks here
- DiDiWorks here
- S.RIDEWorks here
- BoltNot here
- GrabNot here
GO the big taxi-hailing app, and the one to install · Uber which dispatches ordinary taxis here · DiDi taxis again · S.RIDE Tokyo
- Against a taxi
- Identical — every app in Japan hails a licensed taxi on the meter.
Japan legalised a narrow form of ride-sharing in 2024, but in practice what arrives is still a taxi with a white-gloved driver.
Time zone and your working day
Asia/Tokyo — 13 hours ahead of you
0 hours of overlap with a 09:00–17:00 day where you are — — your time, — theirs.
No overlap with a 09:00–17:00 day where you are. Working from here means one of you keeps odd hours — their day starts at 20:00 on your clock.
office hours both at once night
Their 09:00–17:00 is 20:00–04:00 on yours.
The difference from the UK, Europe, the US and ten more
Worked out against America/New York, which is where this request looks like it came from.
Internet speedall of Japan
Why these are Japan's numbers and not Nikko's
Home broadband — Fast. Several people on calls at once, large uploads, 4K. Broadband here runs at 1.8× the global median of 130 Mbps.
Mobile data — Fair. Maps, calls and streaming; tethering a laptop works for an hour, not a day. Mobile runs at 61% of the global median of 109 Mbps.
Ookla publishes no separate figure for Nikko, so these are medians for all of Japan. Cities usually beat the national number and remote islands and national parks fall well below it — treat this as the country's shape, not as a measurement of the street you will be staying on.
A median is the middle of every connection tested there, old copper and new fibre together — so in a country part-way through laying fibre it sits well below what a fibre line actually delivers, and a rental on one can run several times this number. Half of the connections are slower; a fibre flat is rarely one of them. It says what a place can do, not what your rental does, so every listing on Holistay carries its own measured speed and the date it was tested.
Getting online: Airalo or Holafly — a data eSIM for Japan, installed before you fly and working the moment you land.
Source: Ookla Speedtest Global Index · measured June 2026
Must-see
Nearby day trips
Say a few words
Japanese
- Helloこんにちは — Konnichiwakon-nee-chee-WA
- Pleaseお願いします — Onegaishimasuo-neh-gai-shi-MAS
- Thank youありがとうございます — Arigatou gozaimasua-ri-ga-TOH go-zai-mas
- Yes / Noはい / いいえ — Hai / Iiehi / EE-eh
4 more phrases
- Excuse meすみません — Sumimasensoo-mi-ma-SEN
- How much is it?いくらですか — Ikura desu ka?ee-KOO-ra des ka
- The bill, pleaseお会計お願いします — Okaikei onegaishimasuo-KAI-kay
- Cheers!乾杯 — Kanpai!kan-PIE
Sumimasen does double duty as excuse me, sorry and to get a waiter’s attention. It is the single most useful word here.
Religion
Shinto and Buddhist, practised together
Most Japanese observe both without conflict — Shinto for birth and marriage, Buddhist for funerals. Few describe themselves as religious. Purify hands and mouth at the shrine basin before approaching.
Do's and don'ts
Do
- Take shoes off wherever you see a step up or shoes lined up
- Carry your rubbish until you find a bin — there are almost none in public
- Stand in the queue markings on platforms and let passengers off first
- Receive business cards and change with two hands
Don't
- Do not tip — it causes confusion and can be refused as insulting
- Do not talk on the phone on trains, and keep conversation quiet
- Do not stick chopsticks upright in rice or pass food chopstick to chopstick; both echo funeral rites
- Do not photograph geiko and maiko in Gion — some streets ban it outright and fine offenders
Where to stay in Nikko
No Holistay rentals in Nikko yet — the platform is just opening up. Every listing here will have a video tour and the option to negotiate the nightly price directly with the host.
In the meantime, here is Nikko on the sites that do have the inventory — each search is already filled in:
- Booking.com hotels, guesthouses and apartments — the widest coverage almost everywhere
- Airbnb whole homes and apartments, and the better option for a week or more
How to get there
Fly into Tokyo Haneda HND
3hfrom the airport· 135 km as the crow flies
3h by train via Asakusa.
Also worth pricing: Narita NRT — 4h, and the Tobu limited express is the direct way.
Google Flights · Rome2Rio for the trains, buses and ferries as well as the flights
