About 20 minutes north of Boca, the Morikami Museum and Japanese Gardens offers a genuine change of scenery without leaving the county. It sits on a 200-acre park in Delray Beach, with 16 acres of Japanese gardens at its center, koi in the lakes, bridges over the water, and shaded paths that stay cooler in the morning. It is the kind of place a lot of locals mean to visit and somehow keep putting off.

The gardens and museum are here year-round, but two special exhibits are on view only through August 30. After that they move on, so if you have been meaning to go, this summer is a good reason to finally make the trip.

What You’re Getting Into

The gardens come first. Morikami moves through six distinct styles of Japanese garden design, reflecting periods from the 8th century to the 20th, along with a well-known bonsai collection. The main path loops roughly a mile around the lake and takes about 45 minutes to an hour at an easy pace.

Inside the museum, the Yokai exhibit brings together about 90 woodblock prints and illustrated books featuring ghosts, demons, and shape-shifting spirits, drawn from more than 250 years of Japanese folklore. On view alongside it is Courage and Compassion, which tells the story of the Japanese-American experience during and after World War II and connects to the Yamato Colony, the Japanese farming community that began in what is now northern Boca Raton.

When you are ready to sit, the Cornell Cafe serves a Japanese-influenced lunch, with terrace seating that looks out over the gardens. The bento box is a popular pick. The cafe is open 11am to 3pm, so it helps to plan your visit around it if you want to eat on site.

The Insider Move

Aim to arrive when the museum opens at 10am on Sunday. Mornings tend to be cooler and quieter, the light through the gardens is nicer for photos, and the shaded walkways are more comfortable before the midday June heat sets in. If you think you will come back, an individual membership is $60 a year and includes free admission, which works out to about four visits to pay for itself.

What People Say

With more than 2,000 reviews on TripAdvisor, Morikami is among Delray Beach’s most reviewed and well-rated attractions. A phrase that comes up often is “hidden gem,” and visitors tend to single out the bonsai collection, the terrace lunch at the Cornell Cafe, and the quiet. More than a few also mention wishing they had visited sooner.

A Little Background

Morikami sits on land donated by George Sukeji Morikami, one of the last remaining settlers of the Yamato Colony, a Japanese farming community established in northern Boca Raton in the early 1900s. He gave the land to Palm Beach County so that Japanese culture would remain part of South Florida’s story, and the museum opened in 1977.

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