Rhojani Francisco
Writer
Table of Contents
Most people who reach Inuyama arrive for the castle, and most leave within three hours.
That is a reasonable way to spend a morning. The keep is one of only twelve original castle towers left standing in Japan and one of five designated National Treasures, the view over the Kiso River from the top floor is genuinely worth the steep stairs, and the castle town below has skewer shops and a shrine or two. By early afternoon most visitors are back on the Meitetsu line, heading north to Takayama or back to Nagoya.
What they miss is a few minutes’ walk away, behind a wooden frontage with no sign in English and no reason for a passer-by to stop.
Inside, one family has been making the same drink since 1597. You cannot walk in and ask for a tour.
Not sake. Something considerably rarer than that — and something you cannot buy in Tokyo, order online, or find in any guidebook to the region.
Why Inuyama Belongs on an Aichi Itinerary
Inuyama sits about thirty minutes north of Nagoya on the Meitetsu line, where Aichi meets Gifu on the Kiso River. It is small enough to cross on foot and quiet enough that you will hear the river from the castle town.
For a long time it was almost entirely a domestic destination. That has changed quickly. NAVITIME Japan, which runs the Japan Travel by NAVITIME app, analysed GPS movement data from international visitors over the winter of 2023–24 (Japanese) and found Inuyama first in the country for growth in visitor presence — roughly four times the previous year, ahead of Akaigawa in Hokkaidō and Otari in Nagano, and ahead of every ski resort and hot-spring town in the ranking. Inuyama is also a natural stop on the Shōryūdō route, between Chubu Centrair and the road north to Takayama and Shirakawa-gō.
The practical case is simple. If you are staying in Nagoya, Inuyama is the most rewarding half-day within easy reach. If you are moving between Kyoto and Takayama, it is a natural break in the journey rather than a detour. And unlike the better-known castle towns, it has not yet been reshaped around visitors.
Getting there from Nagoya
From Meitetsu Nagoya Station, the limited express to Inuyama takes roughly thirty minutes. There is no need to reserve. From Inuyama Station’s west exit, the castle town begins within a few minutes on foot and the castle itself is about fifteen minutes’ walk north.
That accessibility is the point: Inuyama works as a half-day without rearranging anything else in your itinerary.
What Is Nindōshu? (And Why It Isn't Sake)
Nindōshu is a Japanese medicinal liqueur. It is not sake, and the distinction matters more than it might sound.
The name carries the plant’s own story. 忍冬 — nindō — means something close to “enduring winter,” after a honeysuckle that keeps its leaves through the cold.
It was originally made as a medicinal preparation rather than a social drink, which is why it survived in a completely different category from sake and why so few people outside Aichi have encountered it. At 24% alcohol it sits nearer to a spirit than to wine.
If you have worked your way through sake tastings in Kyoto and Nara and want something that is not a variation on the same theme, this is a genuinely different category.
A Tradition That Dates to 1597
The Kojima family dates its Nindōshu brewing to 1597 — six years before Tokugawa Ieyasu was appointed shōgun and the Edo period began. They have occupied the same site ever since.
How the family came to make it is a story they tell themselves, and it is worth marking as such: as the Kojima family recount it, an ancestor sent to the Korean peninsula in the 1590s showed mercy to someone on the other side, and was taught the method in thanks. He returned, gave up the sword, and began brewing. Different sources attribute this to the first or the second generation. It is family history rather than documented record, and we present it that way.
What is documented is the scale the house once operated at. An Owari domain register of 1837 lists six licensed brewers in Inuyama, with the Kojima house working 1,350 koku of brewing rice — the largest of them.
Nindōshu was not only made here, either. It was produced in Hamamatsu and in Kishū, present-day Wakayama, and the lords of Inuyama Castle sent Kojima’s up to the shogunal house as tribute. Those other lines ended. This one did not.
The Recipe That Was Never Written Down
Here is the part that makes the tradition genuinely unusual rather than merely old.
Fifteen generations of that. Through the Meiji Restoration, which dissolved the drink’s entire market. Through a war in which rice was rationed and brewing was close to impossible.
And then the arithmetic that any family in this position eventually has to do: if the only complete copy of something four centuries old lives in one person’s memory, four centuries can end in an afternoon.
So the current generation has begun writing it down — accepting that the secrecy which protected the recipe had become the thing most likely to end it.
For the full story — the 1619 scroll left by a wandering monk, the domain ledgers, and the decision to finally record what has only ever been remembered — read the full story of the recipe that was never written down.
Inside the Brewery: A Working Place, Not a Visitor Centre
There is no gift shop, no ticket desk and no interpretive display.
What there is: timber blackened with age, earthen walls, a cast-iron hand press still used to cap every bottle, and ceramic jars sunk deep into the floor — buried so the ground itself held an even temperature through summer and winter, three centuries before refrigeration existed. Stainless tanks stand alongside vessels several generations older, because both are still in use.
Seven structures on the property are Registered Tangible Cultural Properties, a designation the Japanese government applies to buildings judged important to the nation’s heritage. In practice that means the fabric of the place cannot be casually altered, which is precisely why it still looks as it does.
There is a small shop at the street front, and anyone can walk in and buy a bottle. The brewery behind it is another matter. It is a working production site rather than an attraction, it runs no public tours, and that is the honest reason it does not appear in the guidebooks. The Nindōshu Experience is the only arrangement under which visitors are taken through the cellars, and Honey J Travel is the only operator running it.
What the Nindōshu Experience Actually Involves
Honey J Travel arranges small-group visits capped at six guests, with an English-speaking interpreter, so that nothing of what the family says is lost in the retelling. Groups are shared — you may be joined by other travellers up to that limit — but six is the ceiling, and it is set by the size of the room rather than by anything else.
The visit runs about ninety minutes and moves in three parts.
The cellars. You walk the working and historic spaces with a member of the family — the rice press, the buried jars, the equipment that has not moved in generations.
The tasting. Four to five pours, including unfiltered Nindōshu drawn before filtering, and the family’s newer fruit-infused expressions. Guests aged twenty and over take part in the tasting, in accordance with Japanese law; younger guests join everything else.
The bottles. You cap two bottles yourself on the brewery’s hand press and write your own labels by hand.
Then the part people remember. One bottle comes home with you the same day. The second is laid down in the cellar under your name to mature for at least two years — poured for you when you return to Inuyama, or sent on to you once it is ready.
It is the only souvenir we know of that gives you a reason to come back.
How This Differs from a Standard Sake Brewery Tour
Japan has excellent sake brewery tours, and this is not an argument against them. It is a different proposition, and worth being precise about how.
| Feature | A typical brewery tasting | Nindōshu Taiken |
|---|---|---|
| The drink | Sake, widely available | A medicinal liqueur made in one place |
| Access | Public tour, scheduled | Cellars with no public tour, one arrangement only |
| Group | Often 15–30 people | Six at most |
| Host | A guide or staff member | A close staff member of the brewing family |
| Setting | Frequently a purpose-built visitor space | A working brewery, cultural-property status |
| Your part | Watching and tasting | Brewery tour, Capping, labelling by hand, and tasting |
| What you leave with | A bottle from the shop | Two bottles you sealed, one waiting two years |
Who This Experience Suits
Couples and honeymooners.
Repeat visitors to Japan.
Food and drink travelers.
Travelers staying in Nagoya.
Anyone who dislikes a crowd.
Planning Your Visit to Inuyama
When to go
Inuyama works year-round. Cherry blossom along the Kiso River in early April and the autumn colour in November are the peak periods and the busiest. Cormorant fishing on the river runs from June to mid-October and is worth building an evening around. Winter is quiet, cold and probably the most atmospheric time to be inside a cellar.
How much time to allow
A half-day covers the brewery visit and the castle town. A full day adds the castle itself, Urakuen garden and the Jo-an teahouse, and a meal.
If you are combining it with Takayama or Shirakawa-gō, Inuyama fits neatly as the first stop of the day before continuing north. If you are in Aichi for the Asian Games in September and October, see our guide to what to do in Aichi around the Games — Inuyama is the strongest single day trip from the city.
What Else to Do in Inuyama
Inuyama Castle. One of twelve original keeps and five National Treasures. The stairs are steep and the top-floor balcony is narrow, but the view over the Kiso River earns it.
The castle town. A preserved street of wooden machiya between the station and the castle, busiest at weekends, good for eating your way along slowly.
Urakuen and the Jo-an teahouse. A relocated teahouse designated a National Treasure, built by Oda Urakusai, Nobunaga’s younger brother. Quiet, and usually far less crowded than the castle.
Cormorant fishing on the Kiso River. June to mid-October, in the evening.
A tea ceremony by the river. A new wabunka space has opened on the river path below the castle — we wrote about a tea ceremony on the Kiso River after visiting.
If you are building a wider trip around the region, our Discover Aichi guide covers what else is within reach — the pottery town of Tokoname, indigo dyeing at Arimatsu, and more, all a short ride from Centrair.
Arranging a Visit
Kojima Jōzō runs no public tours of the brewery, and the Nindōshu Experience is the only way inside. It is available exclusively through Honey J Travel, for small groups of six guests at most, as part of an Aichi itinerary or as a standalone half-day.
- 90 minutes
- 1–6 guests, small shared group
- English-speaking interpreter
- Guided cellar visit
- Tasting of 4–5 pours, including unfiltered Nindōshu
- Bottle sealing on the brewery’s hand press, and hand-written labels
- Two bottles: one home with you, one laid down in the cellar
- ¥22,000 per person
- Inuyama, Aichi — 30 minutes from Meitetsu Nagoya Station
Enquire about the Nindōshu Taiken →
Honey J Corporation is a Government-Licensed Class 1 Travel Agency headquartered in Nagoya (Licence No. 2149, TQJ-certified). We work directly with the practitioners and families whose experiences we arrange.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is Nindōshu? Nindōshu is a Japanese medicinal liqueur made from suikazura — Japanese honeysuckle — steeped with rice. It is thick, sweet and herbal, around 24% alcohol, and the sweetness comes from the rice rather than added sugar. It has been made in Inuyama, Aichi since 1597.
Is Nindōshu sake? No. Although it is made at a licensed brewery and uses rice, Nindōshu is a liqueur rather than a sake. It is drunk over ice, with soda, or cut with hot water — not warmed the way sake is.
Can tourists visit the Kojima brewery? There is a shop at the front where anyone can buy a bottle. The brewery itself runs no public tours — it is a working production site, not an attraction. The Nindōshu Experience, arranged by Honey J Travel for groups of up to six, is the only way to be taken through the cellars.
How do I get to Inuyama from Nagoya? Take the Meitetsu limited express from Meitetsu Nagoya Station to Inuyama Station — about thirty minutes, no reservation needed. The brewery is a ten-minute walk from the west exit.
How long does the Nindōshu experience take? About ninety minutes.
How many people can join? One to six guests.
What happens to the second bottle? It is laid down in the brewery cellar under your name to mature for at least two years. After that it can be poured for you on a return visit to Inuyama, or sent on by international courier where the destination country permits alcohol imports.
Is this suitable for a first visit to Japan? Yes, though it rewards curiosity more than it rewards a checklist. Travelers who have already seen the major sights tend to get the most from it.
Is this a private or shared experience? It is a shared small-group experience, capped at six guests, with an English-speaking interpreter. You may be joined by other travelers up to that limit. If you would prefer sole use of the visit, contact us and we will see what can be arranged.
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