Rainy day things to do in Ueno with kids 3 spots
Ueno has Japan's first zoo and a cluster of national museums inside one park. The park starts right outside the station, and everything is within a walk. It suits anyone with small children who wants a whole day in one place.
National Museum of Nature and Science
A national museum shown at full size — dinosaur skeletons, a life-size blue whale.
Stroller OK · Nursing room · Changing table · checked Aug ’26
Japan's oldest museum, six buildings on one site, showing almost only real objects.
Stroller OK · Nursing room · Changing table · checked Aug ’26
Western food in a corner of Ueno Park, from a restaurant founded in 1872.
Nursing room · Changing table · Elevator · checked Aug ’26
The dinosaur floor and the taxidermy halls are inside; what sits outdoors is the life-size blue whale model and the D51 steam locomotive. The Global Gallery rooftop closes in bad weather, and the museum warns that the basement-floor lounge in the Japan Gallery gets very crowded when it rains.
The collection is shown inside six separate buildings: Honkan, Toyokan, Heiseikan, the Gallery of Horyuji Treasures, the Kuroda Memorial Hall, and Hyokeikan. What's outdoors is the garden and the Kuromon gate, and the gate's weekend and holiday opening (10:00 to 16:00) can be called off depending on the weather.
Meals are inside the building. The Western-food restaurant's entrance is on the left side of the front, and it takes no reservations, seating people in the order they arrive. The outdoor part is the beer garden held on the rooftop terrace, entered on the right side of the front and reached by elevator to the fourth floor.