Ueno Zoo
Japan's oldest zoo — open since 1882 — still carries the weight of 1943, when the city's administrator ordered its animals poisoned and starved for wartime propaganda.
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Fourteen hectares inside Ueno Park, split into eastern and western gardens and home to over 2,600 animals across 500 species. The grounds are worth visiting as much for their history as their wildlife: a permanent memorial (rebuilt 1975) marks where bears, elephants, and other animals were deliberately killed on government orders during World War II.
What to look for
- The 1975 animal memorial — commemorating the creatures starved or poisoned in 1943 on Tokyo's wartime orders.
- Shoebills in the western garden, alongside Galápagos tortoises and Steller's sea eagles
- The Aesop Bridge (1961) linking the two gardens — Japan's first monorail once connected the same two sections; it was permanently closed in 2023.
Closed Mondays (Tuesday when Monday is a public holiday); reach it via Ueno Station (JR East or Tokyo Metro) or Nezu Station.
Ueno Zoo is one of 35 sights worth the detour in Tokyo, all bundled offline in Voyage GO — download the Tokyo pack and it sits on your map with no signal, filling your travel passport the moment you walk past.
More to see in Tokyo
- Mode Gakuen Cocoon TowerA 50-story school curved like a cocoon — white aluminum and dark-blue glass, criss-crossed by diagonal white lines — that beat 150 rival proposals and won Skyscraper of the Year.
- Tokyo SkytreeAt 634 metres, the height isn't random — 6-3-4 spells "Musashi," the ancient name for this exact corner of Tokyo.
- Tokyo TowerA third of its steel came from US tanks scrapped after the Korean War — Japan's postwar recovery, painted orange and bolted into the sky.
- National Diet LibraryBorn in 1948 as a "citadel of popular sovereignty," Japan's national library holds 12 million volumes — and anyone can walk in.
- Akihabara (Electric Town)The black market that outgrew itself and became Japan's otaku capital.
- Tokyo National MuseumOne in ten of every artwork Japan has ever officially designated a National Treasure lives here.