Kochi Hidden Gems
Kochi is the most heavily forested prefecture in Japan — around 84 per cent tree cover — and it faces the open Pacific with nothing between it and the weather. Those two facts explain most of the character. The rivers run clear because the catchments are wooded and largely undammed, and the Shimanto is often called the last clear river in Japan, crossed by low bridges built without railings so that floodwater passes over them rather than tearing them away. The rainfall is enormous and the typhoons arrive first here. Historically the isolation made Tosa a place apart, and Sakamoto Ryoma, the low-ranking samurai who brokered the alliance that ended the shogunate, is from Kochi and is treated locally as something close to a patron saint. The city itself keeps an original castle keep and runs a Sunday street market along the road to it that has been trading for three hundred years.
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Climate & Best Season
Warm, very wet and typhoon-prone; among the highest rainfall in Japan. Summer is hot; spring and autumn are best for rivers.
Famous For (Food)
- Katsuo no tataki (seared bonito)
- Sawachi platters
- Yuzu
- Sake
Signature Sights
- Kochi Castle
- Shimanto River
- Cape Ashizuri
- Katsurahama beach
When to Go
Kochi is one of the wettest places in Japan and takes the brunt of the typhoon season from August into September, when travel plans should stay flexible. It is also one of the sunniest between storms. Winters are mild with January highs near 12°C and no snow on the coast. Summers are hot above 33°C. The Yosakoi festival fills the city on August 9–12. The Shimanto is best from late spring to early autumn for canoeing and swimming, and bonito is landed most heavily in spring and again in autumn. The Sunday market runs every week of the year.
Getting Around
Kochi Airport is about 40 minutes from the city and the fastest way in, roughly an hour and a quarter from Haneda. By rail, the Nanpu limited express runs from Okayama in about two and a half hours after the shinkansen. Once here, distances are the problem: the prefecture is long, and Cape Ashizuri at the western end is over three hours from the city by train and bus, while Cape Muroto to the east has no railway at all. The Tosa Kuroshio Railway extends the network partway. For the Shimanto valley, the capes and the mountain villages, a car is effectively required.
Local Food
Katsuo no tataki is bonito seared hard over burning rice straw so the skin chars while the centre stays raw, then sliced thick and eaten with garlic and salt rather than soy — the straw is the part that matters, and the harbour at Kure is where to watch it done. Sawachi is a large communal platter of sashimi, sushi and fried food, built for drinking parties. Kochi drinks more than most of Japan and has the local breweries to match. Yuzu is grown in the mountain villages and turns up in everything from ponzu to salt.