![]() ![]() Here, every year, the men from Asohara construct flimsy looking wooden walkways that are propped up against the sheer rock face to ensure the relative safe passage of hikers.Īs we descended one of the wooden ladders, literally in the shadow of the bridge, two huge chunks of ice – the size of small cars – parted company with the underside of the arch spanning the gorge, accompanied by a couple of ear splitting cracks, and crashed into the waters below. Beyond the S-Bend (where the river carves an S shaped course through the rock) and the stunningly beautiful Juji-kyo (where two tributaries join the main river from both left and right sides forming a perfect cross) we made it to the famous Ice Bridge. Unlike the last time I was up that way the sun was shining down on our backs and the waters churning in the narrows below us were the most vivid of blues. My old hiking buddy Patrick had flown in from Vietnam and, as usual, we were stuttering to a start early on day two.įifteen minutes later he was stripping down on the trail, bristling as he shoved his great woolly brown jumper into his pack and slipping into a cold, sodden, black, nipple rippling tee, still drenched in the previous day’s sweat.īy the time we’d made it through the Cold War-esque tunnels of the Sennintai Dam and back up onto the right hand side of the river he was steaming up the shirt good and proper, filling it with half a gallon of new day’s perspiration. Ten days after my aborted foray deep into the Kurobe Gorge I was back at Asohara Onsen chomping at the bit for the trek up through the Shimo-no-rokka. “I’ve left my i-phone in the toilet,” he said. ![]()
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