You might have seen the movie "Jurassic Park" by Steven Spielberg once in your life. Giant body with rough skin, shiny and sharp claws, and gruesome eyes staring at its prey. The roar of Tyrannosaurus would have made your hair stand on end.
In Japan, there is a place like a real Jurassic World. It is Fukui Prefectural Dinosaur Museum. It is one of the world's biggest three dinosaur museums and it is one of the best Japanese dinosaur museums.
We will share the information and review of Fukui Prefectural Dinosaur Museum in this article. Welcome to the Japanese ancient dinosaur world!
The best dinosaur museum in Fukui prefecture
The Fukui Prefectural Dinosaur Museum (FPDM) is located in Katsuyama City in Fukui Prefecture of the Hokuriku region. This region is along the Japanese seaside, and it takes three and half hours from Tokyo by bullet train. It is a heavy snowfall area and is famous for fishing good crabs called Echizen crabs.
Aside from good crabs, Fukui is also famous for finding fossils. The fossil investigation was started in 1989 by Fukui Prefectural government, and many fossils of dinosaurs, animals, and plants were found in this area.
In 2000, FPDM was built for researching and providing education about dinosaur fossils, and is a good spot for sightseeing in Fukui prefecture. It has been renewed in 2023! It has four floors total from BF1 to 3F and has three main exhibitions: "Dinosaur World," "Earth Sciences," and "History of Life."
Realistic Dinosaurs will welcome you!
The entrance is on the third floor, and right after entering, you will go downstairs to BF1 with a long, long escalator. It feels like you are going under the ground to the ancient era of billions of years ago!
The highlight of this museum is the Dinosaur World exhibition zone on the 1st floor. This floor features 50 dynamic dinosaur fossils!
Some realistic dinosaurs will welcome you with a scary roar! It will be a great experience for children to meet dinosaurs that time-traveled from the ancient era. It was like we were in a real Jurrasic world!
The Earth Science exhibition is also on the 1st floor. Learning about the earth in this area will give you a profound realization of how old the earth is! You will also see many beautiful ancient rocks and meteorites.
There are so many exhibitions, so it takes more than 1-2 hours to walk around the first floor. After seeing the 1st floor, you will go up the escalator and go to the History of Life zone on the second floor.
You can see exhibitions of many ancient creatures like plants, insects, and animals in this zone.
Dino Lab
The second highlight of this museum is the Dino lab! A 32 foot long Tyrannosaurus is exhibited (the bones are a replica) and you can see the bones very close and touch them.
There is also a floor upstairs where you can see the dinoaur bones from bottom to top. It's a good selfie-taking spot with the big Tyrannosaurus fossil!
Restaurant and Gift Shop Information
There are two restaurants in this museum. One is inside the museum and the other one is outside of the museum. Various foods are on the menu like curry, hamburgers, and pasta.
There are some Japanese dishes like soba, rice burgers, and rice bowls. They have special plates with dinosaur-shaped food decorations. Children would be delighted to eat these foods!
There are also two gift shops. You can get cool and cute dinosaur souvenirs like dolls, T-shirts, and lifestyle goods.
＋Infomation
FPDM also has Field Station in different area. The Field Station is a spot where many dinosaur fossils were found.
In this area, you can join a tour to learn about excavation and get a real excavation experience!
The tour takes about two hours, so be sure to put aside enough time on your trip.
If you want to join, you need to book the tour online. Please check FPDM HP or the link below!
https://www.dinosaur.pref.fukui.jp/en/FieldStation.html