Sendai Attractions | The only museum in the world that can see the forest relics of the Ice Age - the Underground Forest Museum (Sendai City Tomizawa Relics Preservation Museum)
#exhibition
Attraction: Underground Forest (Underground Forest)
📍Address: 3-1 Nagamachi Minami 4-chome, Taihaku-ku, Sendai City, Miyagi Prefecture
🕰️Business hours: 09:00~16:45 (please refer to the official website for holidays)
💰Per capita consumption: ¥460 yen, high school students ¥230 yen, junior high school and elementary school students ¥110 yen
💞Recommended reasons:
The first time I learned about this museum was on someone else’s SNS. When it comes to Sendai attractions, there are no more than Matsushima, Sendai ruins or Zuihoden. So when I came to this underground forest museum, almost all of them were Japanese, and there were not many foreign tourists.
Transportation guide: Take the Subway Namboku Line from Sendai Station and get off at "Nagamachi Minami" station. It's about a 5-minute walk from West Exit 1 and West 2.
The Underground Forest Museum is also known as the Sendai City Tomisawa Ruins Preservation Museum. The site was originally intended to build an elementary school, but during the excavation process, a large area of Sotonani Forest World was accidentally discovered 5 meters below the surface. Doesn’t it sound very attractive~ In the 30th survey from 1987 to 1988, in addition to the discovery of trees, cones, leaves, insect wings, deer dung and other remains in the forest remains, stone tools and campfires were also confirmed Wait for prehistoric remains. These were unprecedented discoveries in the world at the time, so they attracted great attention, and more than 120 surveys have been carried out. Due to the importance of the Tomizawa ruins, the Underground Forest Museum (Tomizawa ruins preservation museum) was established at the current site.
In the most popular exhibition room, what comes into view is the large forest ruins. When I looked at the photo, I thought it was just a small oval. I didn’t expect that the person standing next to it would be so small and shocking. I really didn’t expect that I would be able to see the remains of the Ice Age 20,000 years ago with my own eyes and keep them intact. According to reports, 20,000 years ago, the Fuze area was a wetland terrain covered with coniferous forests. The average climate was 7 to 8 degrees lower than today. Unfortunately, the trees in the ruins have disappeared. In order to protect these relics, the museum dug down 20 meters and built an outer wall about 80 centimeters thick to protect the relics from underground water. Videos and lights in the exhibition area simulate the scenery of the Ice Age and daily human life in the Paleolithic Age three times an hour. Standing in the museum is like going back in time and immersing yourself in the past.
The exhibition room on the first floor introduces the preservation method of forest relics, using special chemicals to preserve the trees for a long time without being affected by air or moisture. There are also introductions to animals and plants, how humans made tools in the Stone Age, etc. The entire museum is not big, and it only takes about an hour to browse carefully. I sincerely recommend that everyone don’t forget to visit this Ice Age world when you come to Sendai.