hamamatsucho

A daimyo garden directly outside the station. It was laid out from 1678 on land granted to the shogunal councillor Okubo Tadatomo, and its pond once drew seawater in from Tokyo Bay, rising and falling with the tide. Landfill closed it off from the sea and water quality ended the tidal system; the pond today is fresh water. The stonework and the shingle shore remain as they were when this was coast.

💡 Open 9:00–17:00 (last entry 16:30); there is an admission charge. Three minutes from the station, and a loop of the pond takes about half an hour.

The Tokugawa family temple. Tokyo Tower rises directly behind the main hall, so the great wooden roof and the red steel lattice sit in one frame — a view that appears on its own as you walk up from the Hamamatsucho side. The Sangedatsumon gate dates from the early Edo period and survived the wartime air raids.

💡 A 14-minute walk from the station; the grounds are open through the day. For the shot with the tower, stand a little right of centre and the tower rises beside the roof.

The port for ships to the Izu Islands and the Ogasawara Islands. Overnight sailings run to Oshima and Hachijojima, and Chichijima in the Ogasawaras is a full twenty-four hours away. This is effectively the only place in central Tokyo you can board a ship and leave for an island. A deck in front of the terminal looks out over the moored vessels and the far bank.

💡 A pedestrian deck runs to it directly from the station, so you stay dry in rain. You can walk onto the deck without boarding anything.

A motsu-yaki grill open since 1929. It opens at 15:30 and a queue forms before that. The house speciality is tataki, a minced skewer with cartilage worked through it, limited to one per customer. The tare sauce has been topped up rather than replaced for decades, and the fact that you can drink here from mid-afternoon says a good deal about this district.

💡 15:30–21:30. Mostly counter and standing room, and the turnover is quick. To avoid the crush, come right at opening or after 20:00.

Tonkotsu ramen: a Kyushu pork-bone base built up in a Tokyo idiom with mentaiko and spicy mustard greens. The chain started in Harajuku in 1984 and this is one of its branches. It stays open until 22:00, useful when you are waiting on a boat or a flight.

💡 11:00–22:00. The loaded bowl with everything on it is the thing to order. It stands near the Shiba-Daimon crossing, on the way to Zojoji.

A soba house serving both the pale, refined sarashina noodles and a thicker rustic soba. It is on the third floor of an office building, and only the sign is visible from the street, which makes it easy to walk past. At lunch it fills with people who work nearby.

💡 Two sittings: 11:00–14:00 and 17:00–20:30. Late lunch or early evening is the quiet stretch.