On April 28, 2024, a sunny day, I went to visit the hometown of Crayon Shin-chan—Kasukabe.

Crayon Shin-chan might be a childhood memory for many people. So where is the actual setting of Crayon Shin-chan? According to sources, it is Kasukabe in Saitama Prefecture, Japan.

This time, taking advantage of the annual Wisteria Festival in Kasukabe, I specially visited the hometown of Crayon Shin-chan—Kasukabe.

Arriving in Kasukabe

It takes about an hour by train from Tokyo to reach Kasukabe Station.

Now, due to Crayon Shin-chan, the departure music and station decorations at Kasukabe Station are all filled with elements from Crayon Shin-chan.

The Kasukabe Station that appears in the anime is quite old, and it looks completely different from the current Kasukabe Station!

Upon exiting the station, you can see a map of various attractions in Kasukabe.

Because today is the Wisteria Festival, everyone is heading to the festival site.

Wisteria Festival Venue—Wisteria Avenue

There were really a lot of people, and combined with the high temperature today, I was sweating profusely.

Since it's called Wisteria Avenue, naturally there are wisteria trees. The roadside trees (vines?) on both sides of this avenue are all wisteria.

However, by the time of the Wisteria Festival, the wisteria flowers were already withered and falling, which is a bit unfortunate.

Some classic Japanese stalls: chocolate bananas, goldfish scooping, shooting games, and... pinball?

Are the patterns on this pinball machine really licensed by Nintendo and other companies? 😅

Display of the new Crayon Shin-chan bus in Kasukabe.

Some street performances.

You can see that a large proportion of the performers are elderly, a truly vigorous group!

Lunch Time

For lunch, I had hamburger steak.

In Japan, you can skip anything except rice—rice is a must!

Plat Kasukabe: Kasukabe's Tourist Information Center

After lunch, we went to Plat Kasukabe, the comprehensive tourist information center of Kasukabe.

In Japan, wherever there is a tourist attraction, the first thing to do is visit the local tourist information center.

As the information center for Crayon Shin-chan, it naturally features many elements from the series.

Various Crayon Shin-chan merchandise are displayed.

A simple introduction to which locations in Kasukabe appear in the original work.

Comparing them, the lines in the manga version are really simple.

There is also a row of reproduced original manga drawings.

I grabbed a walking map of Kasukabe, Crayon Shin-chan stickers, and paper for stamping.

Kasukabe City Museum of Local History

Although it has nothing to do with the original work, it contains a lot of information about Kasukabe's local customs and Japanese history. It's also very close to the information center, and you can get stamps there, so I decided to visit.

LaLa Garden Kasukabe

A very large comprehensive commercial center in Kasukabe.

The third floor is a Crayon Shin-chan themed amusement center.

Shin-chan's family.

Some signboards.

Shin-chan's golden butt, it feels great to touch! 🤣

This is the overall view.

Golden statues and various rubbings.

This game center is very thoughtful, teaching everyone how to grab dolls 😂.

Found a "Hell Girl" pachinko machine.

Speaking of which, this game center has quite a few pachinko machines, and it allows minors to enter and play before 6 PM, so I saw many kids playing these machines 😅. I really didn't expect that.

Kasukabe Ito-Yokado

A department store that often appears in the original work.

There is a dedicated area in the store for exhibiting "Crayon Shin-chan."

It also introduces various famous places in Saitama Prefecture. It seems there are many places to visit in Saitama!

Return Trip

Since my friend wanted to go to Shinjuku, we went to Shinjuku after visiting Kasukabe.

We hadn't had dinner yet, so we had a bowl of soy sauce ramen in Shinjuku.

After finishing our business, since we were already there, we visited the usual Marui department store.

Took two photos of familiar signboards.

Conclusion

Overall, it's clear that Kasukabe is making great efforts to integrate itself with the "Crayon Shin-chan" IP. However, since the original work has limited scenes, if you go for a pilgrimage to the settings, there are only a few places to visit.

So, in my personal opinion, if you go to Kasukabe just for "Crayon Shin-chan," you might find yourself with nothing to do. Combining the trip with local festivals and other tourist attractions can make the journey more colorful and enjoyable.