[Itinerary and Map] Northeast Japan Tohoku 【旅行日程】東北地方

The 2011 earthquake, tsunami and nuclear incident occurred in the region of Northeast Japan, or Tohoku (東北) in Japanese. The region covers a large swath of northern Honshu (the main island of Japan), spanning 6 prefectures, facing the Pacific Ocean in the east and the Japan Sea in the west. The impact from the disaster was mainly in the coastal areas on the Pacific side only, and now that quite a few years had past, most places are on their way to recovery. The summer heat in Tokyo was getting strong, and heading north is a good way to cool down. It’s a good time to visit the Northeast.

It’s quite a hectic itinerary as we would be travelling through all (but one) of the prefectures in 9 days, starting from the south on the eastern side in Yamagata prefecture (山形県), going through Miyagi (宮城県), Iwate (岩手県), all the way to the northern-most point of Honshu in Aomori prefecture (青森県), then coming back down on the western side to Akita (秋田県). We weren’t adventurous enough to visit Fukushima (福島県) yet – it’s disappointing to see how the nuclear situation there is still not completely sorted out.