TRAVEL IN JAPAN
Nakasendo Way — Hiking the Ancient “Road Through The Mountains”
Off the beaten path in Japan
Pre-pandemic, when Japan’s borders were open to tourists, I had the pleasure of taking groups of adventurous foreigners along some of the ancient roads of Japan.
A favorite was the Nakasendo Way, one of five main roads used during the Edo era (1603–1868) for daimyos to travel from their domains to and from the capital, Edo (Tokyo).
The Tokaido, known today as a shinkansen route, and the Nakasendo were the two highways that linked the capital of Edo to the imperial city of Kyoto. Like all of the five main roads, they started at the Nihonbashi Bridge in Tokyo.
The Tokaido went along the coast, crossing wide rivers, before meeting up with the Nakasendo for the final stretch to the Sanjo Bridge in Kyoto.
The Nakasendo Way, 中山道, “the way through the mountains,” took a 500 km route through the heart of Japan. It was not only used by daimyos, merchants, and pilgrims, but princesses who were to be married to shoguns.
The most famous of these was the 16-year-old Princess Kazunomiya, who was compelled to leave her fiancé in Kyoto and marry the 14th shogun, Tokugawa Iemochi, in 1862.
