Where to Stay in Fukuoka, Fukuoka Prefecture

What is Fukuoka known for?

Fukuoka is known as the largest city on Kyushu, a historic port on Hakata Bay and the nearest of Japan's main-island cities to the Asian mainland. Trade shaped it early. Merchants and envoys crossed from the continent through the old Hakata quarter, and the reception hall of the Kōrokan once received them by the shore.

As the capital of Fukuoka Prefecture, it keeps a distinctive dialect and cuisine of its own, along with the Fukuoka Art Museum, the Hakata Machiya Folk Museum, and a port life still centred on Hakata Bay.

What are the main landmarks in Fukuoka?

Kushida Shrine is the historic heart of the Hakata quarter, the shrine whose Kushida Ginkgo has stood in its precinct for generations. Old and new sit close. The reception hall of the Kōrokan and the Hakata Machiya Folk Museum record the port's continental trade, while the Fukuoka Art Museum and the Fukuoka Prefectural Museum of Art keep its collections.

Down at the harbour a marker rises. The Hakata Port Tower stands over the piers on Hakata Bay, near the Genkō Historical Museum that recalls the medieval sea defences of the coast.

What is the history of Fukuoka?

Fukuoka grew from the ancient port of Hakata on Hakata Bay, the nearest landing of Japan's main islands to the Asian mainland and a centre of continental trade since early times. Settlers reached the area in the Yayoi period, and the shore later received envoys and merchants at the reception hall of the Kōrokan. Trade came by sea.

The old Hakata quarter around Kushida Shrine handled the goods and travellers crossing from the continent for centuries. The coast also faced invasion, and the medieval sea defences remembered in the Genkō Historical Museum were raised against fleets from across the water. In 1889 the merchant town of Hakata and the samurai castle town on the western bank joined as the single modern city, taking the castle side's name of Fukuoka.

Two towns became one. Distance from Kyoto, Osaka, and Edo let the port keep a dialect and culture of its own, a Kyushu identity that the Hakata Machiya Folk Museum still records along the shore of Hakata Bay.

Where is Fukuoka?

Fukuoka lies along the shores of Hakata Bay on the northern coast of Kyushu, the capital of Fukuoka Prefecture and the largest city of the island. The built-up area spreads across a coastal lowland that a river once split into two towns, opening north onto the sheltered bay and its islands. Low hills frame the plain.

Facing the Asian mainland across the sea, it holds the closest large-city landing among Japan's main islands to the continent.

What is the climate of Fukuoka?

Fukuoka has a warm, humid climate tempered by its place on Hakata Bay on the north coast of Kyushu. Summers turn hot and muggy. The rainy season and the late-summer typhoon months bring the heaviest rain to the bay shore, and warm currents keep the coast mild well into autumn.

Winters stay mild and often grey, with wind and rain off the sea and only rare snow settling on the lowland around Hakata Bay.

How do you get to Fukuoka?

Fukuoka sits at the western end of the main bullet-train line, the fast rail link between Kyushu and the cities of Honshu to the east. Trains terminate at Hakata. The port on Hakata Bay runs ferries to the nearby islands and across to the Asian mainland, while a subway network links the station, the harbour, and the western museum grounds.

Buses and rail fan out from the Hakata quarter to the shrine precincts and the waterfront around the Hakata Port Tower.