Choshi: A Tiny Train to the Lighthouse at Kanto's Edge

Choshi sits at the far eastern tip of the Kanto plain, where the land runs out into the Pacific. The town’s own slogan says it best: chikyu no maruku mieru machi — “the town where you can see that the Earth is round.” I went in April 2024, parked at Choshi Station, and spent a half day doing the town’s three best things: a very small train, a very white lighthouse, and a plate of sardines.

Choshi Station’s welcome arch. The oval sign carries the town’s boast: “the town where the Earth looks round.”

Quick facts

Japan’s pluckiest little railway

From Choshi Station, the Choshi Electric Railway wobbles 6 km through cabbage fields to the cape. It is a famously endangered little line — it has stayed alive for years partly by selling nure-senbei, wet soy-dipped rice crackers, and the trains themselves are lovingly retro.

The Miotsukushi-go, in its blue livery, waiting to amble toward the cape.

Two practical notes from my ride: buy the one-day pass at the station — it came with souvenir discounts and paid for itself immediately — and get your nure-senbei at the Inubo Station shop (I did; soft, soy-soaked, and better than the novelty suggests).

Inubosaki Lighthouse: 99 steps, ¥300, all the Pacific

The white tower on the cape has been warning ships off these rocks since 1874, when it was built under the British engineer Richard Henry Brunton. Three hundred yen gets you onto the spiral staircase — ninety-nine steps, tiring but nowhere near punishing.

Ninety-nine steps inside. You can see the gallery you’ll be standing on.

At the top, the sea wind hits you hard enough to feel like part of the admission price — bracing, not miserable — and the Pacific does the rest. What stayed with me was the white spray of waves breaking on the reef straight below.

From the gallery: the reef, the spray, and a lot of planet.

Lunch: Choshi sardines, Italian passport

Choshi is one of Japan’s great fishing ports, and sardines are its signature catch. At Kimigahama Bay House, a few minutes from the lighthouse, that catch turns up as sardine arrabbiata — fried iwashi over spicy tomato spaghetti with crisped garlic. Local fish, Italian clothes, very good idea.

Sardine arrabbiata at Kimigahama Bay House — the port’s signature fish, dressed up.

A note for train people

No car? The Shiosai limited express runs from Tokyo Station to Choshi in about two hours — and since 2024 it uses the E259 trainsets that also work the Narita Express, so the ride out is half the fun.

An E259 at Choshi Station — the Shiosai now runs on Narita Express hardware.

Worth the trip?

As a half day: absolutely — the little train, the climb, and the sardines make a complete, unhurried morning. I spent the afternoon in Sawara, the canal town an hour back toward Narita, and the two pair perfectly: here is that half of the day.