Naruko Gorge

Naruko Gorge lies above the hot spring town of Naruko in Osaki. The Otani River has cut it about a hundred metres deep, and the walls stand in cliffs of pale rock, weathered into odd shapes with trees growing out of them.

The view most people come for is from the Ofukazawa bridge, an arch thrown across the gorge, which is itself the thing usually photographed. From the deck you look down the length of the ravine.

Along the river there are short out-and-back paths: about 350 metres from the rest house on the Nakayamadaira side to a bridge, and about 230 metres in from the Naruko side. They are open in the daytime and close without warning when the weather turns. The other is a circuit of 2.2 kilometres from the rest house, which follows the stream through the woods. The riverside paths open from late April to late November, 9:00-16:00, and may close without notice in bad weather. The circular path is open through the day in the same season.

The gorge is best known for its colour. The leaves turn from the middle of October and hold through the middle of November, with the last week of October and the first of November the usual peak.

The pale rock of the cliffs shows between the trees while they are turning, and it is that contrast, rather than the leaves alone, that the gorge is known for.