When visiting Senso-Ji, it’s hard to miss walking through the Nakamise Shopping Street. Stretching from the Kaminarion Gate to the Hozoman Gate, the Nakamise Shopping Street is lined with various small shops and food vendors.

The Nakamise Shopping Street is a very popular tourist spot, especially with the most famous temple in Tokyo, Senso-Ji, next to it. So it gets very busy during the day. Knowing this, we decided to get there early at about 9 am.

There was still a decent number of people on the street, but the crowds were quite light compared to how it would be later in the day. One of the reasons we wanted to get there early was to see the artwork painted on the shop shutters that you can only see when they are closed. It seemed like less than half of the shops had opened by 9, so we still got to see quite a few designs.

Of the many shops on the street, we visited a shop that sells costumes for pets, plushes, and most importantly has a wide selection of various maneki nekos. We’ve been to this shop twice now and on the first trip we got the cutest fat maneki neko that also doubles as a tea cup. On the return trip we snagged a sleeping one.

The rest of the shops had souvenirs, clothing, prints, and more. There are many food shops that range from different confections to baked cookies and crackers. We stopped by a stand that sold ningyo-yaki and got one shaped like a bird and the nearby five-story pagoda. These little pancakes were filled with delicious adzuki bean paste.

While the main concourse is lined with small shops and food stands, the side streets have larger stores and restaurants. One of these side streets is where we found Imahambekkan and had some great shabu shabu and sukiyaki.

We later returned to the Nakamise Shopping Street after lunch and the crowds were much worse. We were very glad to have came through earlier. Regardless of the number of tourists, the street is still a lot of fun to wander through.

Google Maps Link: Nakamise Shopping Street