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From the crush of the morning commute to the evening crowds flowing into shops, restaurants, and bars, Tokyo’s image is that of a city that never stops and rarely slows down. It is all too often portrayed as a strange carousel of lights, sounds, and people set on fast-forward, but these days there is a greater focus on cultural development and quality of life.
For a time it seemed that Tokyo was becoming the city of the future—compact urban life, surrounded by high-tech skyscrapers, the world’s densest rail system, and a 3-D network of highways overlapping and twisting above the city. Twenty years of gradual economic stagnation have cooled that vision, but if Tokyo no longer sees itself as the city of the future, it seems to have settled comfortably into being a city of the present.
While parts of the city such as Shibuya or Shinjuku’s Kabuki-cho continue to overwhelm with a 24-hour cacophony of light, sound, and energy, other neighborhoods are surprisingly relaxed. In Ometesando and Aoyama, people are more likely to be sipping wine or coffee with friends at an outdoor café than downing beer and sake with coworkers in an izakaya (a bar that serves food). The people are as varied as their city. Residents of Aoyama may wear European fashion and drive fancy imports, but those residing in Asakusa prefer to be decidedly less flashy.
Even the landscape is varied. The city hosts some of the most unsightly sprawls of concrete housing—extending for miles in all directions—in the world, but offsetting all the concrete and glass is a wealth of green space in the form of parks, temple grounds, and traditional gardens.
Whether you're gazing at the glow of Tokyo's evening lights or the green expanse of its parks, this is a city of astonishing and intriguing beauty. If you're a foodie, artist, design lover, or cultural adventurer, then Tokyo, a city of inspiration and ideas, is for you.
For some traditional Japanese relaxation, head to this smart hot-spring facility a couple of minutes south of Sanrio Puroland. Gokuraku Yu combines nine indoor and outdoor baths (gender-separated), as well as a sauna and a salon that offers body massages and facial treatments. There’s also a restaurant on-site serving soba noodles, simple teishoku sets, and sweet treats.
If walking around 13 floors of geeky goods at Nakano Broadway tires you out, stop by Kotobuki (just to the north) for a muscle-soothing bath. Tokyo’s neighborhood baths have been in steady decline in recent decades as only the oldest of homes now comes without a bath or shower. Some, however, like Kotobuki, are clinging on as places to socialize and unwind, and though it’s a modest facility, a soak here is a very immersive (pardon the pun) local experience. Just note that it opens late: from 4 pm 'til 12:30 am, so it's definitely something to do after your shopping spree.
Once you’ve located Kotobuki Yu’s orange building and have found your way to the gender-separated baths, the key thing with any public bath is to follow the basic etiquette. First, you need to be completely naked in the baths and make sure your wash towel doesn’t go in the communal bathtub. You also need to wash and rinse well in the seated shower area, before getting into the baths. After that, just enjoy a piping-hot soak and then try the on-site sauna.
Once upon a time, when bathtubs in private homes were a rarity, the great defining social institution of Japanese urban life was the relaxing sento: the local public bath. And if the sento was also an onsen—a thermal spring—with waters drawn from some mineral-rich underground supply, the delight was even greater. No more than a handful of such places survive in Tokyo, but the Oedo Onsen managed to tap a source some 4,600 feet below the bay and then turn the traditional onsen experience into a fun, kitschy theme park. Visitors can choose from several indoor and outdoor pools, each with different temperatures and motifs—but remember that you must soap up and rinse off (including your hair) before you enter any of them. Follow your soak with a massage and a stroll through the food court—modeled after a street in Yoshiwara, the licensed red-light district of the Edo period—for sushi or noodles and beer. Charges include the rental of a yukata and a towel.
Guests with tattoos are not allowed in the park.
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