Sakagawa Shrine to Itoga Inari Shrine Over The Itoga Toge Pass

 

After leaving Yuasa I continued north on the Kumano Kodo Kiiji Trail, first up river and then into the mountains.

First stop was Sakagawa Shrine, site of the Sakagawa Oji.

The main kami enshrined here are Izanami, Susano, and Hayatama. 

Versions of the three kami of Kumano,...... not surprising

From here a small, narrow road that later becomes a track, then a trail, heads up towards Itoga Pass.

I am heading into "orange" country. While oranges are grown in many places in Japan, in the mountains in this area the crop dominates....

Beacuse so much of the natural forest has been cut down to make way for the orange orchards, there are more views over the surrounding area....

The path is not so steep

I believe that nowadays a few more people are walking this section of the Kumano Kodo, but back in 2016 when I walked it, I didn't pass a single other walker/pilgrim.

Orange farmers tend to work on very steep slopes, so the preferred method of carrying things is small, motorized monorails. Construction workers also use such things when working on steep slopes.

Itoga Pass, 190 meters above sea level, used to have a couple of teahouses servicing the multitudes of pilgrims who passed this way in the Edo Period.

The way down to the Arida River is steep.

This was the end of March, so the colours are not of approaching Autumn but the pink and red of cherry blossoms forming.....

I very much enjoyed this section of the Kumano Kodo..... I found the most popular section, the nakahechi, a little bit too over-touristed, somewhat pretentious, and too much of it covered in sugi tree farms.....

Coming into Itoga on the south bank of the Arida River, I spied Itoga Inari Shrine, so headed over to investigate. The previous post in this series on my walk along the oldest pilgrimage route in Japan, the Saigoku Kannon Pilgrimage, was on the birthplace of soy sauce, Yuasa.