Kumamoto Castle

Kato Kiyomasa finished this castle in 1607 and built it to be attacked. The stone walls curve outward as they rise, gently at the base and almost vertical at the top, a profile called musha-gaeshi, warrior repelling, which cannot be climbed. There were 49 turrets. The wells inside were dug deep enough for a long siege and the tatami were reportedly stuffed with dried taro stalks while dried gourd went into the walls, both edible if the food ran out.

It was tested once, in 1877, when Saigo Takamori's rebel army besieged it for fifty days and failed to take it. The keep burned a few days before the attack began, from a fire nobody has explained, and the garrison held anyway. Saigo is said to have remarked that he had been defeated not by the government but by Kiyomasa.

The keep you see is a 1960 concrete reconstruction. Then came the 2016 earthquakes, which brought down walls and turrets across the site; the Iidamaru five-storey turret was left standing on a single narrow column of surviving stones, an image that became the symbol of the prefecture's recovery. Reconstruction of the keep finished in 2021 and it is open again. The rest of the site will take until roughly 2052. Then a further earthquake on 28 July 2026 did fresh damage and closed the castle; it reopened on 13 August with access still restricted, so check what is open before you go.

That makes this a rare thing: a castle where you can watch major restoration work in progress. An elevated walkway carries visitors over the damaged areas so you see collapsed walls, numbered stones waiting to be replaced, and the scale of what an earthquake does to a fortress.

Entry is around 800 yen. Suizenji garden is fifteen minutes away by tram.