Kumano Kodo
UNESCO World Heritage Site: Sacred Sites And Pilgrimage Routes In The Kii Mountain Range (2004) · Tanabe, Wakayama
A network of ancient pilgrimage trails through the forested mountains of the Kii peninsula, walked for over a thousand years by emperors, aristocrats and commoners on their way to the three Grand Shrines of Kumano. With the Camino de Santiago in Spain it is one of only two pilgrimage routes listed as World Heritage. The classic route is the Nakahechi, crossing the mountains from Tanabe to Kumano Hongu Taisha over several days, on stone-paved paths through cedar and cypress forest, past small oji shrines, tea-house ruins and mountain villages. Near Hongu stands the Oyunohara, the old site of the shrine on a river sandbank, marked by the largest torii gate in Japan. The other two shrines are Hayatama Taisha in Shingu and Nachi Taisha, beside the Nachi waterfall, the highest in Japan, with a vermilion pagoda in front of it. Walkers stay in family-run minshuku and hot-spring villages such as Yunomine, with its tiny riverside bath. Luggage transfer services make it easy, but accommodation is limited and must be booked well ahead.
1110 Hongu, Hongu-cho, Tanabe, Wakayama, 647-1731, Japan
NO OPENING TIME HERE WAS CHECKED. The structure: the trails are open at all hours but should only be walked in daylight; the shrines open from early morning to evening; visitor centres keep daytime hours. Traps: mountain buses run only a few times a day and the last one can leave in mid-afternoon; luggage transfer requires bags ready early; minshuku serve dinner early; typhoons and landslides close sections without notice. Confirm times before relying on them.