Introducing mountains in Japan (7) Mt. Aizu-Koma (Aizukomagatake)

At the top of Mt. Aizu-Koma

Mt. Aizu-Koma (Koma-ga-take)

Mt. Aizu-Koma is in "Fukushima-ken".   Now "FUKUSHIMA" is very famous for the nuclear power plant accident in 2011.    The plan is located on the Pacific Ocean side and the mount is located on the mountain side.

The area is about 250km from Tokyo.   It is hard to access using train and most of people drive a car to get there.  The most popular trail head for this mountain is called "Hinoemata" where is also another trail head to Mt. Hiuchi (Hiuchi-ga-take) in Oze (Previous post for this area) from the north side.  This is also a good trail.

The region is also an area getting a lot of snow in winter in Japan.  Since I really like back-country skiing and I only visited there for skiing.   However, hiking in the other seasons is also very nice to see many wild flowers along the trail as well as very beautiful changing color in autumn.

Hinoemata

Hinoemata is a very small village in FUKUSHIMA.  It is famous for Japanese noodle "SOBA".  Also, there are some public hot springs in this area.   There is a big pool using hot spring as well.   The area used to be very quiet and not many people were visiting there.   However, after some development, the area is getting famous and more people are visiting there.

It is very nice we can take hot springs after hiking and we can eat nice Japanese noodle "SOBA".

Season to visit

 In winter time, it might be hard to be there due to so much snow over there.  As I mentioned that people usually need to drive a car to get there, therefore, it is not easy to drive a car in winter time.  I guess the best season is spring to autumn.   In early spring, there is still much snow to enjoy back country skiing.  Without ski, I guess it might be hard to climbing up there.

Late in spring to autumn, different wild flowers along the trails and driving there is much easier than winter.  People can enjoy many things in this area.

It is not easy to get a rent car for foreign people to drive there.   However, it is worth to visit if you really like quiet and beautiful nature over there.  You may take a train and take a taxi to be there.  It would be a long drive from a train station.  In this case, people may take Tohoku-Shinkansen to Nasu Shiobara station, then taking a taxi to Hinoemata.  It will take a several hours from Tokyo.