A few weeks ago I finished a call with someone who had just come back from the Kumano Kodo in Wakayama. I had reached out because I want to help people plan for this route, and I wanted to hear what the experience was actually like from someone fresh off the trail.
He said it was good. And then, like any honest traveler, he told me the things he wished he had known beforehand.
He didn’t know the first day’s hike would end before noon, leaving him with a full afternoon and nothing planned. He wasn’t sure what to budget for a minshuku, the family-run inns along the route. And he came home with one regret that stuck with me: he had missed Tsuyumine Onsen in Kawayu, one of the oldest hot springs in Japan. Kawayu is also the kind of place where you can dig your own hot pool to soak in the riverbed.
He is the adventurous type. He figured it out as he went. Fine, he said, when I asked how the trip was overall.
But the Kumano Kodo is not a “fine” kind of place. And I don’t want you to miss what it actually is.
The Place Where the Bullet Train Doesn't Go
I lived in Wakayama for over ten years. I understand why most visitors to Japan never make it here. When you are planning a first trip, you go where the pull is strongest. The neon lights of Shinjuku. The temples of Kyoto. The street food alleys of Dotonbori. You cannot go to New York City for the first time and skip Times Square. I get it completely.
But if you only see the Times Square version of Japan, you are only seeing its surface.
The Kumano Kodo is a network of ancient pilgrimage routes threading through the mountains of the Kii Peninsula, connecting to three grand shrines. Pilgrims have walked these paths for more than a thousand years. The stone steps are worn smooth. Moss covers the rocks and climbs the cedar trunks. When it rains, which happens often in this wet corner of Japan, the forest smells like something very old and very alive. My friend walked through patches of late-winter snow, felt the cool air on his face, and passed only about five other hikers in an entire day on the trail.
That kind of quiet is rare in Japan. It is worth going out of your way to find.
At Nachi, there is a spot where you can see the red, three-story Sanjudo pagoda framed against Nachi no Taki, the tallest waterfall in Japan at 133 meters, dropping straight into the valley below. It is one of the most beautiful things I have seen in this country, and most visitors to Japan never see it.
What Most People Don't Tell You about This Place
Here is what I love most about Wakayama, and honestly, it’s more than the scenery.
In Tokyo or Osaka, you can spend a week and never have a real conversation with a local. People are not unfriendly. The cities are simply busy, and the pace doesn’t leave much room for slowness. In the “inaka,” the Japanese countryside, something different happens. People look at you. They speak to you. A shop owner wants to know where you are from. A fellow pilgrim stops on the trail and tells you what the path is like ahead. The family running your minshuku sits with you at dinner and asks you questions.
This is the Japan that most travelers never find. Not because it is hidden, but because the standard itinerary doesn’t go there.
If you are planning a trip to Japan and have already put Tokyo and Kyoto on the list, consider looking a little further south and setting aside a few days for the Kumano Kodo.
My friend figured most of it out on his own, but he came back with a list of things he wished someone had told him first. That list is exactly what I can help you with.
If you are seriously considering this route, hit reply and tell me. I will write back personally. We can talk through which section fits your trip, what to budget, what not to miss, and how to arrive prepared rather than just hopeful.
Most people reading this will stick with Tokyo and Kyoto. A few of you will be curious enough to look further south.
This one is for those few.