Toshogu Shrine: tickets, opening hours and what to see

Toshogu is the mausoleum of Tokugawa Ieyasu, who founded the shogunate that ruled Japan from 1603 until 1868. His grandson Iemitsu rebuilt it in the 1630s in the form you see now, with thousands of carvings, lacquer and gold leaf, in a cedar forest on the hill above the Daiya river. With Rinnoji and Futarasan it makes up the Shrines and Temples of Nikko, a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1999.

Inside the gate, the five-storey pagoda comes first, then the sacred stable with the carving of the three monkeys, see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil, part of a series on the life of a monkey. The Yomeimon gate, white and gold and covered in more than 500 carvings, leads to the inner courtyard and the main hall.

On the right, over the passage to the inner shrine, is the small carving of the sleeping cat. Beyond it, about 200 stone steps climb through the cedars to Ieyasu's tomb, the Okusha: worth the climb for the quiet at the top.

The ticket office at the gate takes cash and has long queues on busy days. If you arrive by train, the ticket sold ahead on GetYourGuide is exchanged for a paper ticket at the tourist centre in Tobu-Nikko Station, open from 8.20am to 5pm, on your phone in front of the staff; screenshots are refused. Rinnoji and Futarasan have their own tickets, and the Toshogu museum is extra.

Opening time is the best time: the coaches from Tokyo arrive from about 10am and leave from mid afternoon. Weekdays are calmer than weekends, and autumn weekends and Golden Week are the busiest of the year. The grand festivals in mid May and mid October bring a procession of more than a thousand people in samurai dress.

The carvings are a code of animals, plants and stories, and a guide makes sense of them. The Ginza coach gives Toshogu two and a half hours with a guide; the Shinjuku coach includes the ticket and a licensed guide; private tours let you set the pace.

A night nearby lets you walk in at opening. Hotel Seikoen is inside the shrine precinct, five minutes on foot; the Nikko Kanaya Hotel and Aratouto are a short walk away.