Kawagoe Castle 川越城 was built in 1457, but the only remaining portion is called Honmaru Goten 本丸御殿, the waiting rooms of the lords visiting the castle. The flatland castle was built at the end of the Edo Period in 1848 for the lord Naritsune Matsudaira. It was opened to the public in 2011 after renovations, and the tatami rooms, garden, and realistic mannequins give visitors a glimpse of what life might have been like at the time.
Kawagoe Castle’s Honmaru Goten
Besides the Honmaru Goten, part of the Nakanomon Moat, one of the outer moats, and the site where the Fujimi Turret used to be can be seen now. The rest of the castle site has been built over by Kawagoe city.
Kawagoe Castle’s Honmaru Goten samurai room
For castle fans who collect the 100 Meijo stamps, there is a display of what all the 100 stamps look like in one of the rooms in the palace. Japanese castle lovers will enjoy a great book (Japanese language only) about the castle with lots of old period maps and a map of the original castle overlaid on a map of present-day Kawagoe.
Honmaru Goten is open from 9 am to 5 pm. It is closed Mondays and the 4th Friday of every month. If these days are a holiday, the following day will be closed instead. It is also closed from December 28 to January 4.
Kawagoe Castle interior (photo: museum.city.kawagoe.saitama.jp/hommaru)
Admission is 100 yen for adults, 50 yen for high school and college students, and free for junior high school students and younger. There are several combination tickets with places like the Kawagoe City Museum.
It is located across from the Kawagoe City Museum at the Honmaru Goten stop of the Eagle loop bus in Kawagoe, Saitama Prefecture.
川越城本丸御殿 2-13-1 Kuruwamachi, Kawagoe, Saitama Prefecture 350-0053
The website has minimal English: http://museum.city.kawagoe.saitama.jp/hommaru/
