Yokohama city is a special place for Japan’s history. After a long isolated time of Japan, the first place where Japan opened the door for the world was Yokohama city. American navy came to Japan at Meiji Era and they strongly persuaded ( or forced ) Japan to open the country. America and Japan made a friendship and trade exchange treaty in Yokohama then.
Since that time, many foreign influence came into Japan through Yokohama Port. If you walk Yokohama, you will find western cultural influence a lot on the street or on the building designs too. When westerners came to Japan, Chinese trading people also came to Japan, and some who settled in Yokohama later formed Chinatown.
In this area, there are more than 6000 Chinese now. This is said to be the biggest Chinatown in east Asia.
I’ve visited and enjoyed Chinese foods there so many times. The characteristics of Yokohama Chinatown is, I think, the town is clean compared to other countries’ Chinatowns in the world. New looking restaurants are also in beautiful buildings, so the feeling we often have in Chinatown like old and a little dirty image is not here in Yokohama Chinatown.
It’s also a very hard job to select one restaurant among a number of nice restaurants when you go there. Large and beautiful looking restaurants are often serving nice food, but at the same time, ooften very small restaurants in old buildings on narrow paths behind the main streets have wonderful taste food.
In average, majority of the restaurants have good taste dish, so you would not make mistake in choosing a restaurant even if you select like a roulette.
Yokohama city is a lovely city for sightseeing and food tasting. Chinatown is a famous tour place, more than that, there are many good international restaurants in Yokohama. I’ve visited many times there, but it’s totally impossible to check all of them out in my life time without going there everyday for exploring new restaurant.
Yokohama is easy for walkers compared to Tokyo. Get a map and you will be able to explore where you want to visit. You can check the hotels and tour in Japan at:
Hotels and Travels in Japan
