SIX TOURS · AND A CLOSURE THAT COVERS MOST OF THE MONKEY SEASON
Togakushi’s cedar avenue and the monkeys — except from 7 January to late April
The four-hundred-year-old cedars above the Zuishinmon gate are the reason anyone pairs Togakushi with anything. They are also behind a barrier for the months most people come to Nagano to photograph monkeys in snow, and that collision is what this page is for.
6 of the 21 tours in this catalogue stop at both. They run from $131 (≈¥20,400) a person to $526 for the vehicle, and the one with the most reviews behind it — Snow Monkey Private Day Tour Hotel Pickup and Drop-Off — has 126.
SOURCE MARKS IN THE MARGIN官official — the park or the operator publishes this二confirmed by two independent sources計counted here, on this page, from the figures above？a single source, so it is stated softly
What Togakushi costs and opens to without a tour
Published pricesEvery figure here is the operator’s or the site’s own, and none of it is what a tour charges. It is the number a tour has to beat, or not beat, for a reason.
¥5,000 (≈$32) — Togakushi and back under your own steam.
¥2,500 × 2 = ¥5,000PUBLISHED PRICES ONLY
From 7 January until late April the Okusha and the Kuzuryūsha are shut and the approach is closed beyond the Zuishinmon — outright, guided tours and snowshoes included. That is January, February, March and most of April: the months the monkeys are actually in the water.
The 6 tours that stop at both
6 of 21 tours4 priced per person and 2 for the whole vehicle, dearest reviews first. Each name opens the full review of that product — its price, its published day and who its operator says it is not for — and every one of them can be booked from the strip below.
A TOUR ACTUALLY SOLVES THIS Togakushi and Jigokudani are on opposite sides of Nagano city with no transport between them: doing both by public transport means Nagano Station twice, and ¥5,000 (≈$32) of reserved-seat bus before the monkeys are paid for. A car and a driver is the honest answer here, which is not something this site gets to say often.
What nobody selling this pairing tells you
Read before bookingA winter tour sold as «Togakushi Shrine» takes you as far as the thatched gate and no further. The cedars begin there and the shrine is another twenty-five minutes up, so the half you came for is the half behind the barrier. Ask the operator which shrine, and in which month.
THE OPERATOR’S PAGE WILL NOT SAY THIS
- CEDARS
- The approach to the Okusha is about 2 km; from the thatched Zuishinmon gate a roughly 500-meter avenue of cedars planted in 1612 — over four hundred years old — runs to the shrine. The grove is a designated natural monument and visitors are asked to keep off the forest floor.
- WALK
- From the approach entrance it is about 15 minutes on foot to the Zuishinmon and another 20–25 to the Okusha, with no vehicles allowed; Chūsha to the approach entrance is about 30 minutes on foot or 5 by car, and all five shrines on foot is about half a day.
- OKUSHA CLOSURE
- Okusha and Kuzuryūsha are shut from 7 January until late April; beyond the Zuishinmon the approach is closed outright — snowshoe trekking and guided tours included — for avalanche and falling-ice risk. In that period the two deities are worshipped at Chūsha, and there are remote-worship points at the approach entrance.
- BUS
- Reservation-only sightseeing express, Nagano Station Zenkō-ji exit bay 7; one flat ¥2,500 (≈$16) one way to the whole Togakushi area, Chūsha and the Okusha entrance alike; about 55 minutes to Chūsha; green-season timetable 1 Apr – 4 Dec 2026, a separate winter timetable after that; one-way tickets only, no IC cards.
- SOBA
- Counted with Iwate’s wanko and Izumo’s soba as one of Japan’s three great soba; served bocchi-mori, five or six mouthful-sized bunches laid on one basket. The soba festival runs 1 September – 15 November 2026.
- BEARS
- The tourism association asks walkers to carry a bell or make noise, avoid dusk and dawn, skip scented products, and be off the trails by about three in the afternoon; hornets need extra care in September and October.
LIVE DATES · $526 (≈¥82,100) · 4.8 FROM 126 REVIEWS · 6 TOURS DO BOTH
The monkeys are the half that needs solving
Togakushi you could reach on your own. Two hours of road each way, a ¥800 (≈$5.1) ticket and a 25–40-minute walk are what a tour is actually for — and 6 of them put both halves in one booking.
OR AND ZENKŌ-JI · AND OBUSE · AND A SAKE TASTING · EVERY TOUR, COMPARED