Picture scrolls of the 53 stages of the Tokaido Road
The picture depicts the western side of Utsunoya Pass and the Okabe Inns. This was the most well known pass on the Tokaido Road and appears in "Ise Monogatari" and other literary works. The picture shows people descending the pass road and two people ascending the pass together while talking. Perhaps they are talking about Narihira (the protagonist of Ise Monogatari) or perhaps they are praying for safety on their journey and deciding if they should buy the famous sweet dumplings. The Okabe Inns are crowded with travelers heading west. They appear to be annoyed because a procession of high status people continues to pass in front of them and they cannot get across.

Nihonbashi
In a corner of Exhibition Room No. 3 "Prosperity of the City", there is a 1/60 model reconstruction of the city of Edo centering on Edobashi and Hirokoji. This picture shows Nihonbashi in that exhibit.
Further to the east, past the Daimyo residences that neighbored Edo Castle on the east, a merchants section of town stretched out from Kanda to Shinbashi in a nearly north-south alignment. Nihonbashi was along the main street that transverses this merchants zone from north to south. This is the starting point of the Tokaido Road that extends in the direction of Kyobashi and Shinbashi.

At the foot of the bridge is an area kept clear as a precaution against disasters. Because it was also an important location for transportation of people and merchandise, a public announcement board was positioned on the southern side (in the right foreground in this picture).