At the tip of the Toei Oedo Line, Hikarigaoka is a lively family neighborhood. You’ll find staples of Tokyo suburbs: large residential buildings, schools, nurseries, gymnasiums, sports fields and hospitals, all crossed by large avenues, but also small streets and winding paths restricted to pedestrians and cyclists.
Curiously, however, it is also a very green neighborhood with numerous and vast parks that offer walkers multitudes of flowers and colorful plants all year long, as well as plenty of playgrounds, sports facilities and relaxation areas to welcome families who live nearby.
Hikarigaoka Park: Where Everyone Comes Together
From the station, a broad ginkgo road leads straight to Hikarigaoka Park. This road looks its best in autumn, when many leaves turn bright yellow. From here and all around the park, you’ll see skaters training on the large esplanade, joggers and cyclists taking grand tours, contemplative people sitting on benches and others enjoying picnics under the trees or admiring birds in the protected area around the western pond. There are also those looking for insects in some tall grass that is designed for this purpose.
In Hikarigaoka Park there is a grove of plum trees that bloom at the end of winter. In this relatively small area, the trees huddle together and offer their cottony branches to the gaze of walkers. In spring, it’s the cherry trees’ turn to bloom. Many come here to settle down and celebrate the season. Their beautiful low branches make them perfect spots for photographers too. During the warmest months, trees of all kinds provide shade and a cool resting spot.
Flowers All Year Round
In the park, as well as around the neighborhood, if you keep your eyes peeled, you can find some flowers in bloom, no matter the season or time of year.
Head to the Four Seasons of Incense Rose Garden in spring and fall for divine colors and scents aplenty. While you’re there, sign up for one of the many activities held on-site, including but not limited to ikebana and the making of seasonal decorations. Around Christmastime, there are also small illuminations in the evenings.
Next to the rose garden, you’ll find a small green space devoted to aromatic plants as well as another garden filled with magnolia of different varieties that bloom in spring. Across the main street, you can also wander through an azalea park. In another area, you’ll find camellias with a wide diversity of shapes and colors, including red, pink and yellow.
On the southeast side of Hikarigaoka is Tagara Plum Grove Park, where the plum trees leave residents and visitors in awe in winter as they look like low-lying, puffy clouds.
Photo by Alice Monard
Where to Shop, Eat and Rest in Hikarigaoka
Right next to the station is a shopping center where residents do their daily shopping. For visitors, there are restaurants and cafés where you can rest after a day wandering the neighborhood. You can enjoy soba, tonkastu, sushi, yakiniku, omurice, or curry as well as many other offerings both inside the shopping center and on the street leading to the park.
For a caffeine fix, you are spoilt for choice: everything from ice cream and shaved ice (kakigori) to pancakes and anmitsu is on offer. Our favorite? The matcha specialties at 108 Matcha Saro. Here, you’ll find original matcha drinks and imagawayaki to be enjoyed warm and featuring seasonal ingredients.
