Japan draws tourists with cats’-eyed view

Tourists wearing traditional Japanese summer kimonos or

Tourism bosses in a Japanese prefecture have come up with what they hope will draw more feline-loving visitors: a Google-style street view for cats.

Billed as a world’s first, officials this week launched an online map that explores the streets of port city Onomichi from the purr-spective of a four-pawed visitor.

“We decided to focus on cats because they know everything about the city, including the back streets,” a tourism spokesman for western Hiroshima prefecture told AFP.

He added that the city of about 150,000 people is known for its many felines and has a street known as “cat lane”.

The map is based on the perspective of Lala, a fluffy kitty with emerald-coloured eyes, who lives with a local hair salon owner.

So far, the map covers just two streets, but plans to expand its reach are in the works using a camera attached to a stick that hovers 20 centimetres above the ground.

Viewers can trace what Lala – appointed the head of the prefecture’s “back street tourism” division – sees from her low-level perspective.

The unlikely feline-focused tourism bid is not Japan’s first.

Provincial Wakayama prefecture drew thousands of tourists to its regional train station where a cat served as nominal stationmaster.

Tortoiseshell-coloured Tama was credited with single-pawedly saving the provincial Kishigawa Line after being appointed as master of the tiny Kishi station.

With the regional railway losing money, the station lost its last human employee in April 2006, passing on the mantle to Tama, who delighted in strolling around her own office wearing the formal uniform cap of Wakayama Electric Railway.

After Tama’s death in June, a new cat took over the position.

Email the Travel Weekly team at traveldesk@travelweekly.com.au

japan

Latest News

  • Destinations
  • News

APT Launches 2025 Asia Adventures

APT has launched its Asia Adventures for 2025, including new luxury holidays in India, Sri Lanka and Japan. Five new tours lead guests to the highlights of India, including a seven-night cruise along the rarely travelled Lower Ganges aboard the Ganges Voyager. Further south, Sri Lanka’s greatest destinations are revealed on a new 15-day Land […]

  • Cruise
  • Luxury
  • News

Seabourn announces Western Kimberley Traditional Owners as Godparents of Seabourn Pursuit

Seabourn has named Western Kimberley Traditional Owners, the Wunambal Gaambera, as Godparents of the ultra-luxury purpose-built Seabourn Pursuit. It is the first cruise line to appoint Traditional Owners as godparents of a ship. Seabourn Pursuit embarks on its inaugural season in the Kimberley region this June. The naming ceremony will take place on Seabourn Pursuit’s […]

  • Luxury

Malolo Island Resort opens brand new Spa

Fiji’s Malolo Island has added another string to its bow – opening its $1.3 million day spa on Thursday, 18th April 2024. (Lead Image: matriarch Rosie Whitton with spa staff) Located at the edge of the resort’s luscious patch of tropical rainforest, the new “Leilani’s Spa” adds another level of elevated experiences to Malolo’s already […]