Saitama with preschoolers (4–6) 3 spots
Saitama is the only place in Japan where you can meet quokkas, often called the happiest animals in the world. Omiya's railway museum keeps 42 real train cars indoors, and the huge underground flood channel known as the 'Underground Temple' is here too. It suits animal- and train-loving kids, with plenty to do on rainy days.
A railway museum with 42 real train cars, most of which you can board.
Stroller OK · Nursing room · Changing table · checked Aug ’26
A 7.3-hectare theme park by a lake, built around the Moomin stories.
Stroller OK · Nursing room · Changing table · checked Aug ’26
A pork theme park where the producer's own hams have won European gold medals.
checked Aug ’26
There is no set route, so a child chooses which of the 42 cars to visit - 36 of them stand in the Vehicle Station, the largest hall. They can drive the mini Hayabusa at Teppaku Hiroba themselves, and ride the Mini Driving Train even though driving it starts at elementary school age. There is also one of the largest railway dioramas in Japan.Age rules on the hands-on programs: driving the Mini Driving Train and the conductor, E5 simulator and driver's classroom all start at elementary school age, and the D51 simulator at junior high. Before school age, the mini Hayabusa and riding the Mini Driving Train are the two that count as working the controls yourself. Programs that need booking are entered through the Teppaku lottery app. The official time estimate is 2-3 hours; one family with a three- and a five-year-old stayed five hours from entry (2026). The car park can fill up on weekends and holidays. Exhibit labels are mainly in Japanese, but the museum app carries commentary in English, Chinese (traditional and simplified), Korean, Thai and more.
Moomin House is the family's home built as it is in the books, and you can go inside and look through it. The free Moomin Valley audio guide covers four areas and fifteen spots, with Moomin speaking from your phone as you approach. The Flying Goblin Zipline Adventure is a flight of about 400 meters over the lake. Kokemus is an exhibition that walks you through Tove's life and the Moomin stories, and the park also holds the Sea Orchestra ship, the Moomin Valley cinema, Hemulen's amusement park, the observatory, the bathing hut, the lighthouse, Snufkin's tent and the terrace over the lake.A one-day pass for ages 4 through high school is 1,000 yen in advance, 1,300 on the day. Buying online or at a convenience store has to be done by the day before; on the day itself only the gate ticket is sold, and the tickets needed to enter that day do not sell out. To use a paid attraction once inside, buy its ticket at the ticket machines in the park. Workshops are joined at the kids' space inside the Moomin Valley shop on the first floor of Kokemus, and some of them need a reservation in advance. Inside Moomin House the only way up and down is the stairs. The park's own guide is two and a half hours or more for Moominvalley Park plus an hour and a half to walk Metsa Village; the family with a 4- and a 2-year-old were there from 10:00 to 17:00 on a weekday.
Ten kinds of athletic equipment stand on the wide natural lawn, plus the wooden mini athletic course for small children. Children can hunt for Yoku, the piglet character who appears here and there around the grounds, and pose at the several face-in-hole boards. Once out of diapers they can use the hot spring Kachofugetsu, where the opposite-sex bath is open to children up to the age of six with a parent.Preschool children enter the lawn area free; elementary-school children pay 150 yen on weekdays and 200 yen on weekends and holidays. At the hot spring the child rate (age 3 to elementary school) is 650 yen on weekdays and 750 yen on weekends and holidays, and a child must be with a parent. The hot spring does not allow food or drink to be brought in, while Saiboku no Mori does — the two rules run opposite ways. Numbered tickets for Restaurant Saiboku are handed out from 30 minutes before opening on weekends and holidays.