Asakusa

Four stations are called Asakusa and they are not the same place. The Ginza Line and Toei Asakusa Line stations sit by Kaminarimon at the southern end; the Tobu Skytree Line terminus is beside the river, and is the one to use for Nikko; and Tsukuba Express Asakusa is a good six or seven minutes north-west of the others, which surprises people carrying luggage.

From Kaminarimon, Nakamise runs due north for about 250 metres to the temple. Crossing it halfway is Dempo-in Street, running east to west, which has the old shopfronts, the ninja on the roof, and about a quarter of the foot traffic. West of that is Hoppy-dori, two lines of open-fronted izakaya that start serving in the afternoon and are as cheap as central Tokyo gets.

East is the Sumida river, the Azuma-bashi bridge, the Asahi building with the golden flame on it, and the water bus pier for Odaiba and Hama-rikyu. Across the water, fifteen minutes on foot, is Tokyo Skytree. Ten minutes west is Kappabashi, the kitchenware street, which is where restaurants buy their knives and where the plastic food models are made.

06:00. Kaminarimon with nobody under it, an empty Nakamise, incense at the main hall, and the seventeenth-century Asakusa-jinja beside it, which survived the 1945 firebombing when almost nothing else did.

08:00. Breakfast. The old cafes around Dempo-in do a proper morning set – thick toast, egg, coffee – for well under a thousand yen.

09:30. Kappabashi, before the crush arrives, for knives and for the wax food. Then the free eighth-floor terrace at the tourist information centre opposite Kaminarimon for the view back up Nakamise with Skytree behind it.

Afternoon. Either cross the river to Skytree and the Solamachi mall, or take the water bus downstream. Hoppy-dori from about four, and monjayaki or tempura for dinner.

After dark. Back to the temple. It is floodlit, the hall is shut but the grounds are open, and the pagoda against a black sky is the photograph everyone is trying to take at noon with three hundred people in the frame.

Nakamise is not a scam but it is a souvenir street, and its prices reflect its address. The things genuinely worth buying there are the freshly made ones eaten on the spot – ningyo-yaki sponge cakes, age-manju, senbei grilled in front of you. The keyrings are the same keyrings as everywhere else. Eating while walking is frowned on here and several stalls ask you to stand aside and finish before moving on; it is a genuine local request, not a formality.

Rickshaw rides are real businesses with published rates, and the pullers speak good English and give a genuinely good short tour. Agree the price and the duration before you get in, because the rate is per person per period, not per ride.

Kimono rental shops are everywhere and most are perfectly decent; the thing to check is whether the price includes dressing and hair, and what time you must return. A same-day return deadline of 17:30 removes the evening from your plan, which is the best part of Asakusa.

Two dates fill the district completely: Sanja Matsuri in May and the Sumida fireworks in July. Both are worth planning around and neither is worth stumbling into.