Michelin Green Guide Kamakura & Yokohama — Three-Star Hokoku-ji and Tokei-ji, and All 38 Starred Sights

What the Michelin Green Guide is — 38 starred sights in Kamakura and Yokohama

This is the Michelin Green Guide (Le Guide Vert), which rates destinations rather than restaurants. The Japan edition is published in France: the 4th edition in 2015, the 6th in 2020, and the current one in 2025. Every star below is given with the edition that awarded it.

The 2015 edition makes the town of Kamakura itself three-star, with Yokohama at one. Kamakura is where Minamoto no Yoritomo established his shogunate at the end of the 12th century, and Zen temples sit in the valleys between its surrounding hills. Kamakura holds most of the stars; Yokohama earns its own by walking the port city and its night views, and the Miura Peninsula by its coastline. Kamakura is about an hour from Tokyo by JR, Yokohama about 30 minutes, so give Kamakura a full day and Yokohama an afternoon and evening.

Three-star Hokoku-ji and central Kamakura — Tsurugaoka Hachimangu, Sugimoto-dera

Hokoku-ji is three-star in the 2015 edition, with its bamboo grove and its statues at two stars. Behind the main hall a garden of moso bamboo opens out, and a tea house inside it serves matcha (for a fee). It is about 10 minutes by bus from Kamakura Station, or 30 on foot. The grove is quietest right at opening.

Nearby Sugimoto-dera, held to be the oldest temple in Kamakura, has two-star mossy stone steps and a two-star Eleven-Headed Kannon, with the Nio guardians at its gate at one star. Zuisen-ji, known for its flowers, is one-star. Back towards the station, Tsurugaoka Hachimangu and Wakamiya-oji, the avenue running straight from it to the sea, are one-star. The temples east of the centre can also be strung together by rickshaw.

Three-star Tokei-ji and Kita-Kamakura — Engaku-ji, Meigetsu-in, Kencho-ji

In Kita-Kamakura the 2015 edition makes Tokei-ji three-star, with its garden and its standing Sho-Kannon at two stars and the Matsugaoka Treasure House at one. Tokei-ji is remembered as the “divorce temple”, where women in the Edo period could take refuge to end a marriage. Tokei-ji bans photography of any kind in its grounds, after repeated trampling of flowers and moss and entry into closed areas. Put the camera away and walk the three-star garden. Admission is free, with a donation requested.

Directly opposite Kita-Kamakura Station, Engaku-ji, the hydrangea-and-round-window temple Meigetsu-in, and Kencho-ji, first of Kamakura’s five great Zen temples, are two-star, with Ennoji and its Enma statue at one. From Kita-Kamakura to Kamakura is about a 30-minute walk temple by temple. In hydrangea season (June) expect a queue at Meigetsu-in.

Hase-dera, the Great Buddha, Zeniarai Benzaiten and Enoshima

On Kamakura’s western side, in Hase, Hase-dera is two-star in the 2015 edition. Built into the hillside, its viewpoint looks down over Yuigahama and the town. Neighbouring Kotoku-in is one-star and its Great Buddha two-star: an 11 m bronze Amida, cast in the 13th century, sitting in the open ever since its hall was lost.

Zeniarai Benzaiten, in a valley below Genjiyama, is two-star as well — wash your money in the cave spring and it is said to multiply. Ride the Enoden west and you reach Enoshima, newly listed in the 2015 edition without stars. It is about 20 minutes from Hase Station, easily done the same day.

Yokohama — Chinatown, Sankei-en, Minato Mirai 21 and Osanbashi

In the 2015 edition Yokohama is one-star, and Chinatown, Yamate and Motomachi, Sankei-en, Minato Mirai 21 and the Landmark Tower are two-star. The city grew from the 1859 opening of the port as a foreign settlement, and Western houses and the foreigners’ cemetery remain up on the Yamate bluff. Sankei-en is a Japanese garden of historic buildings relocated from Kyoto and Kamakura and set around a pond.

The 2020 edition added the Osanbashi International Passenger Terminal, jutting into the harbour, at two stars. Its rolling wooden rooftop deck is open around the clock and faces the Minato Mirai skyline head-on. Also one-star: the Yokohama Archives of History, the Yokohama Port Museum, the sail training ship Nippon Maru and Soji-ji in Tsurumi.

The Miura Peninsula and Jogashima, with model routes

The 2015 edition gives two stars to the Miura Peninsula and to Jogashima at its tip — an island of wave-cut rock platforms and cliffs you walk past a lighthouse and open sea. Kannonzaki, at the mouth of Tokyo Bay, and Hayama Marina and its surroundings on the Sagami Bay side are one-star. Yokosuka’s naval port cruise and the preserved battleship Mikasa are listed without stars.

From Shinagawa it is about 1 hour 10 minutes to Misakiguchi on the Keikyu line, then a bus to Jogashima. The rock shelves get slippery when waves wash over them, and some areas are signed as closed. Stay away in rough weather and follow the signs.

Michelin Green Guide Kamakura & Yokohama — FAQ

Star ratings: ★★★ worth a special journey / ★★☆ worth a detour / ★☆☆ interesting. Stars come from the 4th (2015) or 6th (2020) edition of the Michelin Green Guide Japan, as noted for each sight, and are reviewed with every edition. “Starred sights” counts every entry the guide awards stars to — including buildings inside a site, museum pieces, viewpoints and routes — so it is not a count of separate locations.