Oni no Shitaburui

Locally knownKnown to people who live here. Not in the international guidebooks.

Recherche et rédaction Hinato

Oni no Shitaburuigorgesuspension bridgeOkuizumonatural monument

Préfecture de Shimane · Okuizumo

35.1652°N, 133.0192°E

The name means the demon's tongue trembling, and it comes from a story in the Izumo Fudoki about a shark deity in love with a local goddess. What it describes is a two-kilometre V-shaped gorge on the Omaki River, cut through biotite granite so that the bed is filled with enormous rounded boulders piled against each other under sheer walls. It is designated both a national Place of Scenic Beauty and a Natural Monument.

What makes it unusually approachable is a 2013 rebuild. A barrier-free walkway now runs the full 2.3 kilometres between the Une and Shimotakao car parks, wheelchair-passable end to end, and the Shitaburui Koi suspension bridge crosses the gorge 45 metres above the water on a 160-metre span. That combination — serious geology, an unnerving bridge, and a path a wheelchair can use — is rare anywhere in Japan, and this is a valley in inland Shimane that sees very few visitors.

Informations essentielles

Horaires d'ouverture

Walkway open at all times | No lighting after dark

Fermé: Open year-round | Sections may close in snow or after heavy rain

Tarif d'entrée

Free | Bicycle hire for the return leg by advance booking

Meilleure saison

Late October–early November for autumn colour | May for fresh green

Durée de visite

2 hours for the full 2.3 km walkway one way | 1 hour for the bridge and central section

Comment s'y rendre

Informations d'accès

Okuizumo, Nita District. By car from JR Izumo-Minari Station on the Kisuki Line. Two car parks, Shimotakao and Une, at either end of the walkway. Free to walk. The full route is about 2.3 km one way and takes roughly two hours at a walking pace; bicycles can be hired for the return with advance booking.

Guide d'initié

**Decide which car park to start from.** The route runs point to point between Une and Shimotakao rather than as a loop, so unless you double back you need a plan for the return. Booking one of the hire bicycles in advance is the neat solution; otherwise budget for walking it twice. **The suspension bridge is the halfway payoff.** Forty-five metres above the river on a 160-metre span, and it moves. If bridges are a problem for you, the lower path still reaches the best boulder sections. **Barrier-free is real, not marketing.** The full run between the two car parks is passable by wheelchair, which makes this one of the very few gorges in Japan you can actually see without stairs. Side spurs down to the water are not. **Autumn is the season and the crowd.** Colour here comes in around late October to early November and it is the one time the car parks fill. Any other month you may pass a handful of people in two hours. **Combine with the tatara country.** Okuizumo sits in the same iron-sand district as Sugaya, and the drive between them runs through the terraced rice country that iron-sand mining created. Gorge in the morning, ironworks in the afternoon.

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