JAPN Sendai City Guide: Tanabata Festival, Gyutan and Date Masamune
Sendai City Guide: Tanabata Festival, Gyutan and Date Masamune
Date Masamune’s City
Sendai, the largest city in the Tohoku region with 1.1 million residents, was founded by the one-eyed warrior Date Masamune, who built Aoba Castle on a hilltop above the Hirose River in 1601. The castle ruins provide a park with city views and an equestrian statue of Masamune in his distinctive crescent-moon helmet that has become Sendai’s symbol. The Sendai City Museum below the castle hill houses Masamune-era artifacts including his armor, letters, and items from the Keicho Embassy he sent to Rome via Mexico in 1613.
Zuihoden Mausoleum, Masamune’s ornate burial site rebuilt after wartime destruction, displays the Momoyama-era decorative style with carved peacocks, dragons, and peonies in polychrome paint on black lacquer. Adjacent mausolea hold his son and grandson. The original foundations and bones discovered during reconstruction are displayed in a museum annex. Osaki Hachimangu Shrine, a National Treasure built by Masamune in 1607, survives as an original structure in the ornate Momoyama style.
Tanabata and Gyutan
Sendai Tanabata Festival, held August 6 through 8, fills 3,000 meters of covered shopping arcades with thousands of elaborate bamboo streamers reaching five meters in length, each handmade from washi paper, origami, and ribbons by local businesses over months of preparation. The decorations hang overhead in dense curtains of color through which you walk, brushing against paper lanterns and streamers. Designs incorporate traditional symbols: paper cranes for longevity, kimono for protection from illness, purses for financial fortune, and nets for good catches.
Gyutan (beef tongue) is Sendai’s signature dish, established by restaurant Tasuke in 1948 when founder Sato Keishiro adapted the French technique of tongue preparation for Japanese tastes. The tongue is salt-cured, sliced thick, and charcoal-grilled until the exterior chars while the interior remains pink and tender. Standard sets at restaurants like Rikyu and Kisuke include grilled tongue, barley rice, pickled cabbage, and a tail soup for 1,500 to 2,000 yen. The tongue comes from domestic and imported beef, with Australian beef tongue actually preferred by many shops for its leaner texture.
Day Trips and Access
Matsushima Bay, one of Japan’s three famous views, lies 40 minutes northeast by JR Senseki Line, with boat cruises among 260 pine-clad islands for 1,500 yen. Zuiganji Temple in Matsushima, rebuilt by Date Masamune with elaborate carved transoms and painted screens, is Tohoku’s most important Zen temple. Yamadera, officially named Risshakuji, perches dramatically on a cliff face 60 minutes from Sendai by JR Senzan Line, requiring a climb of 1,015 stone steps to the summit halls where the poet Basho composed one of his most famous haiku in 1689.
Sendai Station is 90 minutes from Tokyo by Tohoku Shinkansen and serves as the hub for exploring all of Tohoku. The city’s tree-lined Jozenji-dori avenue, nicknamed the City of Trees, hosts a jazz festival in September and the Pageant of Starlight illumination in December with 600,000 LEDs on the zelkova trees. The Itsutsubashi area near the station concentrates gyutan restaurants, and the covered Clis Road and Marble Road arcades provide shopping and dining in any weather.
Local Specialties
Beyond gyutan, Sendai offers zunda mochi, rice cakes coated in a sweet paste of crushed edamame soybeans that is bright green and mildly nutty. Zunda shake from the Zunda Saryo chain in the station has become a popular takeaway treat. Sendai’s proximity to Sanriku coast fisheries means outstanding seafood at Asaichi morning market near the station, where stalls sell sea urchin, salmon roe, and oysters. The Jozenji-dori area south of the station concentrates independent cafes, jazz bars, and craft shops beneath the zelkova canopy that defines the boulevard.
Related Guides
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