CURVESCOUT / MOTORCYCLE RIDE
Ordered leg totals agree within rounding. Stop distances are approximate sums of rounded legs. Stops, delays, approach and any separate return travel add time. Basis: producer-declared routed record.
Reading history stays on this device. My road watch requires a separate selection; opening it does not subscribe this ride.
Distance and riding time are measured on the routed road. Check local closures and conditions before you ride.
From Kumano it runs 548 km to Kumano; allow about 8 h 23 of riding. On the way it passes Kumano Sanzan - Nachi Primeval Forest, Pilgrimage Routes - Kumano Sankeimichi - N, Pilgrimage Routes - Kôya Sankeimichi and Nisanzai Kofun. The line favours views over speed.
The Iseji is the eastern branch of the old pilgrimage roads to the three great Kumano shrines, running down the coast of the Kii Peninsula from the Grand Shrines of Ise to Kumano. For centuries, pilgrims followed it through forests and over passes, and stretches of its stone paving still survive in the hills, laid to keep the path usable in one of the rainiest parts of Japan. Owase, a little up the coast, regularly ranks among the wettest towns in the country, and the moss on the stones and the dripping cedar forests show it. The Iseji forms part of the UNESCO listing of the Sacred Sites and Pilgrimage Routes in the Kii Mountain Range.
Read the complete Pilgrimage Routes - Kumano Sankeimichi - I write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Pilgrimage Routes - Kumano Sankeimichi - I is where the day begins. Next is Kumano Sanzan - Nachi Primeval Forest.
Rain made this place, and a lot of it. The Kii Peninsula sticks into the Pacific south of Osaka, steep, forested and very wet, with some of the heaviest rainfall in Japan, and the Nachi river tumbles down its flank in a cascade that has been worshipped for well over a thousand years. Nachi Falls drops one hundred and thirty-three metres in a single plunge, the tallest single-drop waterfall in the country, and the Shinto shrine at its foot, Hiro Jinja, treats the falls themselves as the god. Beside it, on a ridge above, Kumano Nachi Taisha and the Buddhist temple Seiganto-ji sit side by side, with a red three-storey pagoda that frames the white thread of water like a postcard. The two religions here have long lived in the same compound.
Read the complete Kumano Sanzan - Nachi Primeval Forest write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Kumano Sanzan - Nachi Primeval Forest comes up about 41 km into the recorded legs. Next is Pilgrimage Routes - Kumano Sankeimichi - N.
The Kumano Kodō is a web of ancient pilgrimage trails across the mountains of the Kii Peninsula, south of Osaka, leading to the three grand shrines of Kumano: Hongū, Hayatama and Nachi. For over a thousand years, emperors, aristocrats and ordinary pilgrims walked these paths through cedar and cypress forest, stopping at small subsidiary shrines along the way. The Nakahechi, the most popular of the routes, leaves the coast near Tanabe and climbs inland through the hills. It is part of the Sacred Sites and Pilgrimage Routes in the Kii Mountain Range, listed by UNESCO in 2004, one of only two pilgrimage routes on the list along with the Camino de Santiago, with which it is twinned.
Read the complete Pilgrimage Routes - Kumano Sankeimichi - N write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 125 km into the recorded legs you reach Pilgrimage Routes - Kumano Sankeimichi - N. Next is Pilgrimage Routes - Kôya Sankeimichi.
Kōyasan is a city in the sky. In 816 the monk Kūkai, known after his death as Kōbō Daishi, received permission from the emperor to found a monastery on a high, forested plateau in the Kii mountains, and from that start the settlement grew into the headquarters of Shingon Buddhism, with over a hundred temples tucked among the cedars. A few thousand people live in the town, and many of the temples take pilgrims and visitors as guests, serving a vegetarian temple meal called shojin ryori and waking guests for morning prayers. At the far end of the main street begins Okunoin, the great cemetery, where a two-kilometre path winds beneath tall cedars past tens of thousands of moss-covered gravestones to the mausoleum of Kūkai, who is believed to be in eternal meditation rather than dead.
Read the complete Pilgrimage Routes - Kôya Sankeimichi write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Pilgrimage Routes - Kôya Sankeimichi, about halfway. Next is Nisanzai Kofun.
In the middle of the sprawling city of Sakai, south of Osaka, a large keyhole-shaped mound rises above a ring of moats, covered in dense forest and surrounded by houses, roads and shops. This is the Nisanzai Kofun, a monumental tomb built in the fifth century for a member of the ruling elite of early Japan. It is one of the largest of the Mozu-Furuichi Kofun Group, a collection of burial mounds listed by UNESCO in 2019, which includes the enormous Daisen Kofun, traditionally attributed to the emperor Nintoku and one of the largest tombs in the world by area.
Read the complete Nisanzai Kofun write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Nisanzai Kofun sits at 206 km, about halfway. Next is back through Pilgrimage Routes - Kôya Sankeimichi.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Pilgrimage Routes - Kôya Sankeimichi write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Pilgrimage Routes - Kôya Sankeimichi comes up about 324 km into the recorded legs. Next is back through Pilgrimage Routes - Kumano Sankeimichi - N.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Pilgrimage Routes - Kumano Sankeimichi - N write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 422 km into the recorded legs you reach back through Pilgrimage Routes - Kumano Sankeimichi - N. Next is back through Kumano Sanzan - Nachi Primeval Forest.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Kumano Sanzan - Nachi Primeval Forest write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Kumano Sanzan - Nachi Primeval Forest, late in the day. Next is Pilgrimage Routes - Kumano Sankeimichi - I.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Pilgrimage Routes - Kumano Sankeimichi - I write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The route ends here after 548 km.
Pilgrimage Routes - Kumano Sankeimichi - I → Kumano Sanzan - Nachi Primeval Forest is 41 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Kumano Sanzan - Nachi Primeval Forest → Pilgrimage Routes - Kumano Sankeimichi - N is 84 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Pilgrimage Routes - Kumano Sankeimichi - N → Pilgrimage Routes - Kôya Sankeimichi is 99 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Pilgrimage Routes - Kôya Sankeimichi → Nisanzai Kofun is 50 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Nisanzai Kofun → back through Pilgrimage Routes - Kôya Sankeimichi is 50 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Pilgrimage Routes - Kôya Sankeimichi → back through Pilgrimage Routes - Kumano Sankeimichi - N is 98 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
back through Pilgrimage Routes - Kumano Sankeimichi - N → back through Kumano Sanzan - Nachi Primeval Forest is 84 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Kumano Sanzan - Nachi Primeval Forest → Pilgrimage Routes - Kumano Sankeimichi - I is 41 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.