The Hanasaki Summer Pools, aka water or aqua park, are as family and child friendly as the park they are in: Kazo Hanasaki Park. Hanasaki Aqua park is one of the three remaining prefectural pools. Unfortunately, the main Saitama Prefectural Pool in Ageo closed permanently in 2021. The pools inRead More →
Kawagoe Aquatic / Aqua Park aka Kawagoe Suijo Kouen, or Kawagoe Water Park, is one of the bigger and most popular summer pools in Saitama. And now that several pools have closed permanently, it is one of the few public pools left. Like all the other seasonal pools, it normallyRead More →
Ten (artificial) water play areas that are currently operating in Saitama in May 2022. The weather has really started to warm up this week. And its only going to get hotter! Thankfully, this year there is a better selection of water play areas than last year, when only a handfulRead More →
2022 Information for the annual wind chimes and glistening river at Kawagoe Hikawa Shrine. The Enmusubi Wind Chimes at Kawagoe Hikawa Shrine are generally displayed from around the first weekend of July to the first week in September. They follow the lesser known pinwheel event. I have visited the windRead More →
Tokigawa Town in the Hiki District of Saitama Prefecture is just over an hour from Tokyo. The town is famed for a rarer type of Iris; Iris Japonica or Butterfly flowers in English. However, there is also a small Iris garden in the town with the “hanashobu” variety of Iris:Read More →
June Saitama 2022~ the annual list of 15 things to do in June in Saitama! This post was adapted in 2021 for the “new normal”. As that is still the situation in 2022, the post reflects that. But the 2022 list has several new ideas, to keep the post freshRead More →
Have you heard about the Peacock Shrine in Saitama City? Or maybe you know it as the Quiz Shrine? It is one of those shrines that is very famous among Saitama residents and further afield among the history buffs. But it is off the tourist trail. Maybe the locals preferRead More →
Ukiya no Sato is a nature reserve in Kazo City, Saitama Prefecture, Japan. It is part of what is known as the Saitama Green (greenery) Trust – conservation area number ten of fourteen areas in total in Saitama Prefecture. Ukiya no Sato The name of this nature reserve comes fromRead More →
A round up of events in Saitama in summer 2021. Includes information on those events and fireworks that have been cancelled in 2021 and those that are going ahead. Update July 28th 14:08 JST. This information is all very tentative at the moment. Saitama Prefecture is poised to request aRead More →
Saitama Summer Pools 2022 – where is open and where is not. Plus a map of Saitama’s outdoor seasonal pools. The information is accurate, to the best of my knowledge, as of May 22nd 2022. However, all seasonal events and facilities can and have been influenced by the situation withRead More →