Webmaster visited Kunowaki Suspension Bridge before last week. This bridge is located near Shiogo Station of Oigawa Railway (Oigawa-tetsudo).
Access: Tokyo (shinkansen 1:15) Shizuoka (local train 0:30) Kanaya (local train 0:50) Shiogo (walk 0:05) @
Oigawa Railway starts from Kanaya Station.
Oigawa Railway is a single track. The train went toward the upper stream of Oi-gawa River.
Tea plantations were seen from the train window. This region is famous for tea cultivation.
After a 50-mimute ride, Webmaster arrived at Shiogo Station. Kunowaki Bridge is only a five-minute walk from the station.
Doesn’t this look nice? The length of the bridge is 220m.
The notice board (below) at the foot of the bridge says the capacity of the bridge is ten persons.
Let’s cross! The views from the bridge are nice. Upper stream (left) and lower stream (right).
The mountain slope is also beautiful with spring color.
However, crossing this bridge may give you a little thrill because the bridge does not only sway as a nature of suspension bridge but also the tread boards are a little bit narrow.
The foot of Webmaster. Why don’t they lay more planks for widening the passage?
Anyway, going slowly
Then, reached the other end of the bridge
Another interesting point of the bridge is that the bridge crosses over not only a river but also a railway, a road and houses on its left bank.
Shiogo Station from the bridge
On the other side of the river, you can come across tea plantations. Cherry was in full bloom.
When Webmaster had a rest on the other side of the river, a steam locomotive (SL) passed by. In fact Oigawa Railway is the only one railway in Japan running SL throughout the year mainly for touristic visitors.
Oigawa Railway: http://oigawa-railway.co.jp/en/
Then, Webmaster needed to cross the thrilling bridge again, because the train station is on the opposite bank.
End.