Skip to content
Dokumo
Takamatsu — Udon for breakfast, a feudal lords' garden, ferries to the art islands and quiet hill courses a short drive from the Seto Ohashi bridge.

Photo: lienyuan lee · CC BY 3.0 · Wikimedia Commons

Japan

Kagawa, Shikoku

Takamatsu

Udon for breakfast, a feudal lords' garden, ferries to the art islands and quiet hill courses a short drive from the Seto Ohashi bridge.

Sakaide golfSeto Ohashi BridgeRitsurin GardenNaoshima art islandSanuki udonKonpira-sanSeto Inland Sea
Plan a trip to Takamatsu

Why Takamatsu

Takamatsu is the capital of Kagawa, Japan's smallest prefecture, and for most of the 20th century it was Shikoku's front door: rail passengers from Honshu crossed on the Uno–Takamatsu ferry until the Seto Ohashi opened in 1988. The city grew around a castle whose moats still take in seawater, and its great sight is Ritsurin Garden, which the Takamatsu lords spent a century shaping. Ferries for Naoshima and the other art islands leave from the port beside the station, and many udon shops are open in time for breakfast.

Dokumo's trips stay in Sakaide, about 20 km west, where the Seto Ohashi comes ashore. This is one of the driest corners of Japan. Takamatsu gets about 1,150 mm of rain a year, against Tokyo's 1,600, and Kagawa has more irrigation ponds per square kilometre than any other prefecture. The golf courses lie in the low hills inland, ponds and all. Sakaide Country Club is a short drive from the hotel, and on the free day the driver can drop you at Ritsurin Garden, the ferry port for the art islands or downtown Takamatsu.

Good for

  • Golfers who want quiet hill courses a short drive from the hotel
  • A free day of contemporary art on Naoshima
  • Food travelers happy to eat udon three times a day
  • Combining Shikoku with Okayama or Osaka by train over the Seto Ohashi

The map

Where you'll be in Takamatsu

The city's wards, the towns around them and every hotel and golf course our trips use. Tap a ward or a pin.

TakamatsuSakaideMarugameUtazuAyagawaZentsujiKotohiraMannoTadotsuMitoyoNaoshimaTonoshoShodoshimaMikiSanukiKurashikiTamanoTakamatsu AirportTakamatsu StationSeto Ohashi BridgeYashima
HotelGolf courseStationAirportPeakTakamatsu and Sakaide

Boundaries: MLIT National Land Numerical Information (administrative areas), simplified by Dokumo.

6 places

What to see in Takamatsu

The handful that shape a first visit — each with the tip we give every traveler.

Ritsurin Garden

Photo: Takuya ASADA · CC BY 2.0 · Wikimedia Commons

Nature

Ritsurin Garden 栗林公園

The garden of the Takamatsu lords: about 75 hectares of stroll garden set against the wooded slope of Mt. Shiun, with six ponds and thirteen landscaped hills. The Matsudaira family, who took it over in 1642, spent a century shaping it and completed it in 1745. It opened to the public in 1875 and is a national Special Place of Scenic Beauty. Around 1,400 pines grow here, some 1,000 of them trained by hand, and the Kikugetsu-tei teahouse serves matcha over the South Pond.

Our tip — The gates open at 5:30 from April to September and at 7:00 in midwinter, and early morning is the quietest time. JR Ritsurin-koen-kitaguchi station is a 3-minute walk from the North Gate, and wooden wasen boats cruise the South Pond.

Naoshima

Photo: shoyanishikawa from Japan · CC BY 2.1 jp · Wikimedia Commons

Town

Naoshima 直島

A small island north of Takamatsu that Benesse has turned into an island of contemporary art. It began with Tadao Ando's Benesse House Museum in 1992. Ando's Chichu Art Museum (2004) is built mostly underground around Monet's Water Lilies and works by James Turrell and Walter De Maria. Yayoi Kusama's yellow Pumpkin sits at the end of a pier, and since 1998 the Art House Project has turned empty houses in the Honmura district into artworks.

Our tip — On the trip's free day the driver can drop you at Takamatsu port. The ferry takes about 50 minutes and the fast boat about 30. Book Chichu tickets online in advance, and note that Chichu and the Art House Project close on Mondays.

Konpira-san (Kotohira-gu)

Photo: KimonBerlin · CC BY-SA 2.0 · Wikimedia Commons

Temple

Konpira-san (Kotohira-gu) 金刀比羅宮

Kotohira-gu, known across Japan as Konpira-san, is the shrine of sailors and sea travel. From the town, 785 stone steps climb Mt. Zozu to the main shrine, and 583 more lead to the inner shrine. Its Omote Shoin holds sliding doors painted by the 18th-century artist Maruyama Okyo. In the town below stands Kanamaru-za, built in 1835 and Japan's oldest surviving kabuki theatre.

Our tip — The Kotoden line reaches Kotohira in about an hour from Takamatsu-Chikko, and JR trains run from Sakaide. Start the climb early, before the tour groups arrive.

Seto Ohashi Bridge

Photo: Kanchi1979 · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons

Ride

Seto Ohashi Bridge 瀬戸大橋

Six bridges carry an expressway and a railway 9.4 km across the Bisan Strait between Kojima in Okayama and Sakaide, touching down on small islands on the way. It opened on 10 April 1988 after nine and a half years of construction. It carries cars on the upper deck and trains on the deck below, the only one of the three Honshu–Shikoku crossings with a railway. Before it, rail passengers crossed on the Uno–Takamatsu ferry, which had run for 78 years. The JR Marine Liner between Okayama and Takamatsu crosses in under an hour; its Takamatsu-end car is a double-decker with Green Car seats upstairs.

Our tip — The trip's twin rooms at the Sakaide Grand Hotel face the bridge. For the view from the shore, the Higashiyama Kaii Setouchi Art Museum on Shamijima, designed by Yoshio Taniguchi, looks straight at it.

Sanuki udon

Photo: sekido · CC BY 2.0 · Wikimedia Commons

Food

Sanuki udon 讃岐うどん

Kagawa, the old province of Sanuki, has more udon shops for its size than any other prefecture, about two and a half times the national average, and some 500 in all. The noodles are thick and firm. At self-service shops you order at the counter (hot or cold, small or large), help yourself to tempura, oden or an onigiri, and pay at the end. Try kamatama, hot noodles tossed with raw egg and soy sauce, first served at Yamagoe in Ayagawa. In Marugame, look for honetsuki-dori, a spiced chicken leg roasted on the bone, served there since the 1950s.

Our tip — Many of the best shops open in the morning and close by early afternoon or when the noodles run out. Do your udon crawl before noon and order small bowls so you have room for three.

Sakaide Country Club & Kagawa golf

Photo: 国土地理院 · Attribution · Wikimedia Commons

Golf

Sakaide Country Club & Kagawa golf 坂出カントリークラブ・香川のゴルフ場

Sakaide Country Club opened in 1993 in the hills of southern Sakaide. Its 18 holes (par 72, up to 6,728 yards) are laid out wide and mostly flat, with ten ponds, 78 bunkers and bentgrass greens that average about 900 m². The front nine is called Shirasuna and the back nine Ayagawa. The trip's second round is at another Kagawa course that Dokumo recommends, such as Takagawa Shin-Kotonami (1996) in the hills of Manno. Winters here are mild and dry: January averages a high of about 10°C, with under 50 mm of rain a month from December to February.

Our tip — The course is about 20 minutes by car from the Sakaide Grand Hotel and about 40 from Takamatsu Airport, and the trip's driver-guide takes you to both rounds.

Trips

Trips based in Takamatsu

All Trips

Getting there

  • Tokyo HanedaAbout 1 h 20 by air to Takamatsu Airport on ANA and JAL, with around a dozen flights a day. Jetstar also flies from Narita.
  • Seoul IncheonAbout 1 h 45 nonstop to Takamatsu on Korean low-cost carriers, with daily flights.
  • United StatesThere is no nonstop flight to Takamatsu. Fly into Tokyo Haneda and connect to a domestic flight, or connect through Seoul Incheon. From Osaka, the Shinkansen to Okayama and then the Marine Liner across the Seto Ohashi take about two hours.
  • Okayama by railThe JR Marine Liner crosses the Seto Ohashi to Takamatsu in about 55 minutes and stops at Sakaide on the way.
  • Takamatsu Airport to townBy car, Sakaide is about 40 minutes from the airport. The airport limousine bus reaches JR Takamatsu Station and the ferry port in about 45 minutes.

When to go

  • March – MayRitsurin's 320 cherry trees bloom from late March into early April, with evening illumination for about ten days. Highs climb from 14°C in March to 25°C in May, which makes for easy golf weather.
  • June – AugustThe rainy season comes first, then heat and humidity, with August highs near 33°C. Play at first light, and spend the afternoon on the islands.
  • October – NovemberThe best golf weather: highs of 23°C in October and 17°C in November, with rain tapering off as autumn goes on. Ritsurin's maples turn from mid-November to early December. In Setouchi Triennale years (every three years), the islands add new works in an autumn session.
  • December – FebruaryMild and dry, with January highs near 10°C and under 50 mm of rain a month, so the courses stay playable. Outside the New Year holidays, when Konpira-san fills with first-shrine-visit crowds, the shrine and the Naoshima museums are at their quietest.

Beyond Tokyo

Add Takamatsu to your Japan

Tell us your dates and who is coming — a designer replies with a plan that fits Tokyo and Takamatsu into one trip.

Request a quote