Ueno 上野

Ueno is where Tokyo keeps its culture and its bargains side by side. The park on the hill was Japan’s first public park in 1873 and holds the Tokyo National Museum, the National Museum of Western Art in a Le Corbusier building, the science museum with its blue whale, a concert hall and the zoo, all within a ten-minute walk of each other. In spring the central avenue becomes the city’s most famous sakura tunnel, with office workers reserving tarpaulin squares before dawn. Shinobazu Pond at the bottom fills with lotus leaves the size of umbrellas in July.

Below the tracks the mood changes completely. Ameya-Yokocho, the market that grew out of a postwar black market for American goods, runs for 400 meters under the Yamanote line with stalls selling fresh fish, spices, cosmetics, army surplus and knock-off sneakers, their owners shouting prices in the old Tokyo way. Do the museums early, eat a bowl of kaisen-don in the market at lunch, and walk north through the quiet temple grounds to Yanaka if you still have legs.