Kirifuri Falls

Locally knownKnown to people who live here. Not in the international guidebooks.

Researched and written by Hinato

Kirifuri FallsNikkowaterfallKirifuri Kogenautumn foliage

Photo: taro gen / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 3.0) · original

Tochigi has plenty of scenery; Kirifuri Falls is the kind that's worth planning a whole day around.

Kirifuri means falling mist, and the name is descriptive: the water drops in two stages, 25 metres and then 26, breaking against a rock shelf between them so that the lower half comes down as spray rather than a column. It is counted as one of Nikko's three great waterfalls alongside Kegon and Urami, and it is by a wide margin the least visited of them.

The reason is simply that it is in the wrong direction. Kegon is on the road to Lake Chuzenji where everyone goes; Kirifuri is up the Kirifuri Highland road on the other side of town. There is a free car park, a shop and a soba place at the top, and a ten-minute walk down to a viewing platform that looks across at the whole fall. In autumn the slope around it turns and there is often nobody else on the platform. The highland road continues up to meadows and hiking trails that are excellent in early summer.

Visiting essentials

Best season

Mid–late October for autumn colour | Late June–early July for day lilies on the highland above

How long to allow

30–45 minutes | Half a day with the Kirifuri highland

Hours

Open access | Daylight recommended

Closed: Open year-round | Path may be icy in winter

Entry fee

Free | Free parking

Finding your way there

Access notes

Tokorono, Nikko. By car from Nikko IC on the Nikko-Utsunomiya Road, then follow signs from Prefectural Route 169. By bus, take the Tobu bus for Kirifuri Kogen from JR Nikko or Tobu Nikko Station and get off at Kirifuri no Taki. Free parking (roughly 40 and 50 spaces in two lots) with toilets. Free to visit; around a short walk from the car park to the observation deck.

Local knowledge

**It is a view across, not from below.** The observation deck faces the fall from the opposite side of the ravine, which shows both tiers at once. There is no path down to the base — do not go looking for one. **Autumn is the fortnight.** Colour on the surrounding slope peaks from mid to late October, earlier than in Nikko town because of the altitude. That is the one time the car park approaches full. **Continue up to the highland.** Kirifuri Kogen above the falls has meadows with day lilies in late June and early July, and the Kirifuri highland trails and the long Tenku Kairo stairway. The falls alone are twenty minutes; with the highland it becomes a proper half-day. **Eat at the top.** There is a soba place and shops at the car park, which is more than most Nikko waterfalls offer and useful because there is nothing further up the road. **Winter turns it to ice.** The fall partially freezes in the cold months and the walk down can be icy. It is spectacular and it needs grips.

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