Though major cities such as Tokyo and Kyoto will continue to see the majority of visitors in 2023, many rural areas that had been popular destinations prior to the pandemic have used the time off to create more immersive initiatives and experiences for visitors, both domestic and foreign. For many of these tourism-dependent areas, adapting to the “new normal” was essential to their survival. The Japanese government also created incentive programs to encourage domestic residents to rediscover their homeland, and there has been a noticeable increase in Japanese tourists visiting areas that they had previously skipped.
According to Yukie Yamazaki, the spokesperson of the Gokayama Tourist Information Center, before the pandemic, 70% of visitors who stayed in the guesthouses were foreigners; in recent days, though the total number of visitors has returned to 70% of pre-pandemic levels, the villages have started to appeal to Japanese travelers as well, leading to a more authentic experience for all visitors.
Karuizawa is a mountain resort about 65 minutes northwest of Tokyo by bullet train that has long been the apple of affluent Japanese travelers’ eyes. Once a “rest stop” on the old Nakasendo Trail that linked Kyoto and Edo (present-day Tokyo), Karuizawa was relaunched in the late 1800s as a place for Canadian missionaries to get away from Tokyo’s summer heat, and it has held a great appeal to summer home owners, celebrities including John Lennon and Yoko Ono, and regional artists. Known primarily as a place to “get away,” the town has refocused on the remote worker, investing in designer co-working spaces and housing opportunities to cater to a new class of traveler who can work from anywhere while simultaneously creating art experiences, such as outdoor festivals, to appeal to visitors.
On the subject of art experiences, few places have garnered as much attention as the “art islands” of the Seto Inland Sea, headlined by Naoshima and Teshima. Museums and art installations are interspersed through these walkable, ferry-networked islands between Kagawa Prefecture in Shikoku and Okayama on the mainland. Although the museums and facilities themselves are not new, installations and updates are constant, and a triennial international art festival has further cemented its status as an art mecca.
When visiting after the triennial in late 2022, the islands still remained quiet compared with the days before the pandemic. On a warm and sunny afternoon in Naoshima, a drive past the freshly restored Yayoi Kusama pumpkin sculpture that had been destroyed by a 2021 typhoon, saw one lone visitor posing for a selfie. On a 2019 visit at the same time of year in a torrential downpour, there was a 20-minute wait for people in line to take pictures with the polka-dotted gourd.
An overnight stay at the Benesse House Museum allows one to explore after hours ― one other lone visitor and I had the run of the museum to ourselves, which features artists including Bruce Nauman, Hiroshi Sugimoto, Jennifer Bartlett and David Hockney. “A night at the museum” in every sense of the word, it is an otherworldly experience.
Shikoku is also home to the legendary pilgrimage route called the Ohenro, which consists of 88 Buddhist temples dispersed throughout the four prefectures that make up Japan’s smallest island. Each temple has its own distinct character, providing for a very different experience from the more unified Zen temple designs of areas like Kyoto. On one fall afternoon, at the mountaintop Unpenji Temple in Tokushima (No. 66 of 88), I found myself in an “amphitheater” of 500 “Arhat” statues (Buddha’s apprentices), watched over by a lone ginkgo in its spectacular golden glory.
This content was originally published here.
