Short but powerful - Mount Kanayama

What?
Kanayama (金山) is a small mountain of 540 meters in Tamba City (丹波市), a rural community in the center-east of Hyogo Prefecture. It used to house the Kinzan Castle (金山城) of which some traces can still be seen. More famously though it’s home to a strange rock formation called the “demon’s suspension bridge” (鬼の架け橋).
Where?
Located in Tamba City in Hyogo Prefecture, the mountain can be reached by getting off at Kaibara Station (柏原駅) on the Fukuchiyama Line (福知山線), hopping on a bus bound for Sasayama Eigyojo (篠山営業所) and get off at Oire Bus Station (追入).
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Two Cups of Ginger

Getting off the bus we immediately crossed the street and walked towards the small Oire Shrine. The hike to the top of the mountain – or maybe it’s just a hill with its mere 540 meters – starts a little to the left of the shrine. Going up we passed a torii with a big crack in it. As the crack was very clean I wondered why someone would design a torii that way… behind the torii a fence was built to keep monkeys and boars to pass to the village below. Later we would run into a few elegant deer enjoying some shade and sweetness in a fruit garden, so one can equally wonder if such a fence has any efficiency.

Whatever the case, continuing up the hill we passed a few remnants of the old castle. Most just consist of plates put there by the local community, but there were also foundations standing of a temple which I assume was part of the castle. We went straight up to the top which was also the location of the keep of the castle. There are some benches that let you take a break with nice views of green hillsides. Too bad about the giant ants and the many spiders! But am I really going to complain about that when outdoors??

The way up was a bit slippery.

Look at the crack in that torii!

The remnants of the temple.

The surroundings hills shone a beautiful green.

From the “peak” we continued for a few minutes in a loop that led to the demon’s suspension bridge. It’s quite a beautiful spot where you can enjoy a bit of bouldering, climbing and crawling up and down the 3-4 rocks. The mountain isn’t really high, it’s definitely not steep, but standing on one of the rocks did give me a bit of vertigo. Nevertheless we enjoyed the view and the silence for a while. I am pretty sure we were the first that day to go up, and we didn’t see any other people for another while.
In going down we took a loop passing some strange desert-like patch and what we thought was a hornets nest. We weren’t really prepared to check it out though, but the noise was very unsettling. Crisscrossing our way down we eventually arrived at a paved road and a temple. Walking this road back to the Oire Shrine we saw the previously mentioned deer skipping away. In the midst of summer this road was green, but a few months earlier I could imagine the beauty of many flowers blooming.

The whole hike is merely 2 hours, 2 hours and a half tops. It’s maybe perfect for the ridiculously hot summer months, so if you fancy half a day of relaxed walking with a nice view, maybe now is the time.