[{"data":1,"prerenderedAt":210},["ShallowReactive",2],{"site-shirakawa-go":3,"site-stories-shirakawa-go":187,"site-siblings-shirakawa-go":200},{"id":4,"title":5,"access":6,"alerts":10,"bestSeasons":19,"body":23,"coordinates":116,"description":102,"extension":119,"factsCheckedAt":120,"food":121,"heroImage":137,"highlights":138,"meta":145,"nameCommon":146,"nameEn":147,"nameJa":148,"navigation":149,"nearestHub":150,"officialLinks":151,"path":154,"prefectures":155,"region":158,"seo":159,"siteType":160,"sources":161,"stay":169,"stem":182,"summary":183,"unescoRef":184,"year":185,"__hash__":186},"sites\u002Fsites\u002Fshirakawa-go.md","Shirakawa Go",{"outline":7,"duration":8,"costHint":9},"Hokuriku Shinkansen (Kagayaki) Tokyo to Toyama (about 2h15m), then Nohi\u002FToyama Chitetsu express bus from Toyama Station to Shirakawa-go Bus Terminal (about 90 min; reservation recommended). Alternative: shinkansen to Kanazawa (about 2h30m) then express bus about 1h20m. Gokayama's Ainokura and Suganuma are reached separately by the Kaetsuno 'World Heritage Bus' from Takaoka\u002FShin-Takaoka Stations (about 75-80 min to Suganuma, about 2h to Shirakawa-go, 2,000 yen since the November 2025 fare revision), which also links Gokayama with Shirakawa-go (about 30 min). No rail service reaches the villages.","about 4 to 4.5 hours door-to-door","roughly 15,000-16,500 yen one way (shinkansen about 13,000 yen + bus about 2,400 yen)",[11,13,16],{"message":12},"Ensho-no-Yakata, the saltpeter museum at Suganuma in Gokayama, has been closed for repairs since July 31, 2026 with no reopening date announced. Only the Gokayama Folklore Museum next door is open, and the old 400-yen combined ticket is gone: admission is now 300 yen for adults and 150 yen for children.",{"message":14,"validThrough":15},"The 2027 Winter Light-Up runs Jan 11, 17, 24 and 31, 17:30–19:30, and is reservation-only for every visitor. As of the association's July 2026 announcement only those dates and times were confirmed; the reservation routes, car-parking prices and ticket sale dates were all due to be published in early September 2026, so ignore prices carried over from the 2026 event and check the official page before you plan. Daytime sightseeing on event days may enter only until 14:00 and must be out of the village by 16:00; after 14:00 only reserved light-up buses are admitted.","2027-01-31",{"message":17,"validThrough":18},"From December 1, 2026, tour buses using the Seseragi Park (Oro) parking lot need an advance reservation (bookings opened June 1, 2026), so group travelers should confirm their operator holds one.","2027-12-01",[20,21,22],"Winter (January-February) for deep snow scenery and the famous light-up evenings","Autumn (late October-November) for foliage around the thatched roofs","Spring-early summer for rice-planting scenery and fresh greenery",{"type":24,"value":25,"toc":101},"minimark",[26,31,35,38,41,45,50,53,57,60,64,67,71,74,78,81,85,88,92,95,98],[27,28,30],"h2",{"id":29},"why-its-inscribed","Why it's inscribed",[32,33,34],"p",{},"Gassho-zukuri means \"constructed like hands in prayer,\" and one look at the roofline explains it: thatched gables pitched at nearly 60 degrees, far steeper than an ordinary Japanese farmhouse, angled to shed the enormous snows of the Shogawa river valley. The roofs go together without a single nail. Diagonal braces tie the sheathing into one unified structure, a technique found nowhere else in Japan. And the attic isn't dead space; it's divided into as many as four working levels where families raised silkworms, lit and ventilated by windows in the gable ends.",[32,36,37],{},"The valley, on the Gifu–Toyama border, was so remote that into the 1950s it was still being called the last hidden region left in Japan. At the late-19th-century peak, around 1,850 gassho houses stood here, a rounding error among Japan's five and a half million farmhouses. Postwar change nearly wiped them out. What earned the 1995 inscription is the survivors: three villages, deliberately chosen as one large, one medium, one small, that keep the original settlement landscape intact.",[32,39,40],{},"Crucially, they survive as villages, not exhibits. The roofs still get rethatched through yui, the mutual-aid custom by which neighbors climb up and redo each other's roofs together. About 500 people live in Ogimachi alone, farming the same plots their houses were built to serve.",[27,42,44],{"id":43},"what-youll-actually-see","What you'll actually see",[46,47,49],"h3",{"id":48},"ogimachi","Ogimachi",[32,51,52],{},"Start here. Ogimachi is the largest of the three villages, with about 60 gassho farmhouses spread among rice paddies on the valley floor, and walking it is free. Two to four hours covers it on foot; coin lockers at the bus terminal take your bags. The houses are side-gabled, ridges running parallel to the entrance, which is the Shirakawa-go signature. Resist the urge to sprint straight to the viewpoint. The village reads best at street level, where you can see how each house sits on its plot and how close farming still is to daily life.",[46,54,56],{"id":55},"wada-ke-house","Wada-ke House",[32,58,59],{},"The largest gassho house in the village, open 9:00 to 17:00 for 400 yen (as of 2026), and the best few hundred yen you'll spend here. Climb to the attic; this is where the architecture starts making sense. The roof frame is lashed together without nails and stiffened by those diagonal braces, and the upper levels were true working floors, built for raising silkworms under the gable windows. Kanda-ke and Nagase-ke nearby charge the same and are quieter, but if you enter only one house, make it this one.",[46,61,63],{"id":62},"shiroyama-viewpoint","Shiroyama Viewpoint",[32,65,66],{},"That view you already know from every brochure? It's from here. It's a 15-to-20-minute uphill walk from the village, or a 300-yen shuttle (as of 2026) if you'd rather ride. Go after you've walked the streets, not before; the aerial view means more once you know which roof is which. The trail closes during and after heavy snow, when the shuttle becomes the only way up, and on winter light-up evenings the viewpoint is timed-ticket territory reserved for overnight guests and certain bus tours.",[46,68,70],{"id":69},"gassho-zukuri-minkaen","Gassho-zukuri Minkaen",[32,72,73],{},"An open-air museum of 25 gassho buildings relocated from surrounding hamlets, just across the river from the main village, 800 yen (as of 2026). Honest advice: on a half-day visit, skip it, because the living village outside is the point and Wada-ke covers the interior story. But if the weather turns, or you want to poke around buildings without wondering whose home you're standing in, it earns its ticket. It closes Thursdays from December through March.",[46,75,77],{"id":76},"ainokura","Ainokura",[32,79,80],{},"Up the valley in Toyama Prefecture, on the Kaetsuno World Heritage Bus line, and a different temperament entirely: roughly 20 gassho houses on a mountainside shelf with a fraction of Ogimachi's foot traffic. Look closely at the roofs. Gokayama houses are front-gabled with eave attachments at the gable ends, unlike their Shirakawa-go cousins. The Folklore Museum is 300 yen (as of 2026); the 500-yen combined ticket adds the Traditional Industries Museum and its washi paper story, one of the trades that kept these villages alive.",[46,82,84],{"id":83},"suganuma","Suganuma",[32,86,87],{},"The smallest piece of the inscription: nine gassho houses and historic storehouses on a bend in the Shogawa. Most visitors see it in under an hour, and that's fine. Ensho-no-Yakata, which told the strangest chapter of the local economy — the quiet production of saltpeter for gunpowder in these remote farmhouses — has been shut for repairs since July 31, 2026 with no reopening date given, and the 400-yen combined ticket went with it. That leaves the Gokayama Folklore Museum next door, 300 yen for adults and 150 for children as of 2026. With time to spare before your bus, Murakami-ke House in nearby Kaminashi (400 yen as of 2026; open 9:00 to 16:00, closed Tuesdays and Wednesdays and from mid-December through February) adds one more gassho interior.",[27,89,91],{"id":90},"worth-knowing","Worth knowing",[32,93,94],{},"Ogimachi keeps office hours. Paid houses stop admitting visitors between 16:00 and 17:00, parking runs 8:00 to 17:00 with last entry at 16:30, and after that the village belongs to the people who live there and the handful of guests sleeping in the farmhouses. Day-trippers hoping for night photos will be disappointed, year-round; plan around this rather than against it. Two closure quirks catch people out: Kanda-ke House closes Wednesdays, and the Minkaen closes Thursdays from December through March.",[32,96,97],{},"This is nobody's theme park. Doors that look like exhibit entrances are front doors. Stay out of gardens and private land, keep to the lanes, smoke only in marked areas, and leave the drone at home; they're banned throughout the village.",[32,99,100],{},"On seasons: the snow scenes that made Shirakawa-go famous come at a cost — winter buses fill fast, the viewpoint trail shuts in heavy snow, and light-up evenings are locked behind reservations. Mid-October, when the Doburoku Festival brings cloudy festival sake out for tasting, or spring, when flooded paddies mirror the roofs, are far easier and nearly as good.",{"title":102,"searchDepth":103,"depth":103,"links":104},"",2,[105,106,115],{"id":29,"depth":103,"text":30},{"id":43,"depth":103,"text":44,"children":107},[108,110,111,112,113,114],{"id":48,"depth":109,"text":49},3,{"id":55,"depth":109,"text":56},{"id":62,"depth":109,"text":63},{"id":69,"depth":109,"text":70},{"id":76,"depth":109,"text":77},{"id":83,"depth":109,"text":84},{"id":90,"depth":103,"text":91},{"lat":117,"lng":118},36.2556,136.9019,"md","2026-08-04",[122,125,128,131,134],{"name":123,"note":124},"Hoba miso","Sweet miso grilled tableside on a magnolia leaf, often topped with Hida beef or pork; Restaurant Irori in Ogimachi serves a hoba-miso pork set around a sunken hearth, English menu included.",{"name":126,"note":127},"Hida beef street snacks","The premium local wagyu turns up as skewers and croquettes along Ogimachi's main street for an easy lunch between houses, or as full steak sets if you sit down.",{"name":129,"note":130},"Doburoku","Cloudy, unfiltered, lightly alcoholic sake brewed for Shirakawa-go's mid-October Doburoku Festival; tasteable and buyable in the village.",{"name":132,"note":133},"Gokayama stone tofu (kata-dofu)","Tofu pressed so firm it was traditionally carried tied with rope, a Gokayama-only specialty alongside grilled iwana river char and wild sansai vegetables.",{"name":135,"note":136},"Gohei mochi","Pounded-rice cakes grilled on skewers under a sweet glaze, sold as a walking snack in the villages.","\u002Fimages\u002Fsites\u002Fshirakawa-go-hero.webp",[139,140,141,142,143,144],"Ogimachi village, the largest gassho-zukuri settlement, with over 100 traditional buildings","Wada House, the largest gassho farmhouse open to visitors","Shiroyama (Ogimachi Castle ruins) observation deck panorama over the village","Winter illumination (Shirakawa-go Light-Up, select January evenings; reservation required)","Quieter Gokayama villages of Ainokura and Suganuma across the Toyama border","Farmhouse (minshuku) stays and Hirase Onsen hot spring",{},"Shirakawa-go & Gokayama","Historic Villages of Shirakawa-go and Gokayama","白川郷・五箇山の合掌造り集落",true,"Toyama Station (also reachable from Kanazawa, Takayama or Nagoya by express bus)",[152,153],"https:\u002F\u002Fwhc.unesco.org\u002Fen\u002Flist\u002F734\u002F","https:\u002F\u002Fshirakawa-go.gr.jp\u002Fen\u002F","\u002Fsites\u002Fshirakawa-go",[156,157],"Gifu","Toyama","Chubu",{"description":102},"cultural",[152,162,153,163,164,165,166,167,168],"https:\u002F\u002Fwhc.unesco.org\u002Fen\u002Flist\u002Fxml\u002F","https:\u002F\u002Fshirakawa-go.gr.jp\u002Fen\u002Faccess\u002F","https:\u002F\u002Fwww.japan-guide.com\u002Fe\u002Fe5953.html","https:\u002F\u002Fwww.japan-guide.com\u002Fbus\u002Fgokayama.html","https:\u002F\u002Fgokayama-info.jp\u002Farchives\u002F9106","https:\u002F\u002Fwww.kaetsunou.co.jp\u002Fregular\u002Ffare","https:\u002F\u002Fshirakawa-go.gr.jp\u002Fevents\u002F438\u002F",[170,173,176,179],{"area":171,"note":172},"Ogimachi (Shirakawa-go village)","Sleeping in a gassho farmhouse (Shiroyamakan, Onyado Yuinosho, Koshiyama, Guest House Kei) means hearth-side dinners and the only legal way to see the village after dark, but rooms are scarce, light-up dates go by lottery, and you must book months ahead.",{"area":174,"note":175},"Ainokura (Gokayama)","The quietest farmstay option in the whole inscription, nearly tourist-free after the last bus leaves; expect minimal English, bring cash, and plan around the sparse World Heritage Bus timetable.",{"area":177,"note":178},"Takayama","A full range of ryokan and business hotels 50 bus-minutes away, easy to pair with the old town, but you give up the village at night.",{"area":180,"note":181},"Kanazawa (or Takaoka for Gokayama)","Best shinkansen connectivity, with a direct express bus of about 1 hour 20 minutes to Shirakawa-go; base at Takaoka or Shin-Takaoka instead if Gokayama is your priority.","sites\u002Fshirakawa-go","Villages of steep thatched gassho farmhouses, built to shed heavy snow and raise silkworms in the attic. Over 100 stand at Ogimachi, some open to guests.","734",1995,"k8fHLevZwp-93U0-XCoCkquTMycn5gWiCnZVX4gzbfI",[188,194],{"path":189,"title":190,"topic":191,"summary":192,"heroImage":193},"\u002Fstories\u002Fshirakawa-go-first-timers-day-hour-by-hour","Hands in prayer: a first-timer's day in Shirakawa-go, hour by hour","Itinerary","No train reaches Shirakawa-go, and that is the first thing to plan around. A realistic hour-by-hour day trip from Tokyo: the buses, Wada-ke's silkworm attic, hoba miso at lunch, and the honest case for staying the night instead.","\u002Fimages\u002Fstories\u002Fshirakawa-go-first-timers-day-hour-by-hour.webp",{"path":195,"title":196,"topic":197,"summary":198,"heroImage":199},"\u002Fstories\u002Fshirakawa-go-gokayama-skip-the-crowds","Skip the crowds: why Gokayama is the gassho village you'll remember","Gokayama","UNESCO listed three villages in 1995, and almost everyone visits only one. How to string Suganuma, Ainokura, and Ogimachi together on the World Heritage Bus, what stone tofu and saltpeter have to do with it, and why the night belongs to farmstay guests.","\u002Fimages\u002Fstories\u002Fshirakawa-go-gokayama-skip-the-crowds.webp",[201,205,209],{"path":202,"nameCommon":203,"region":158,"year":204},"\u002Fsites\u002Fmt-fuji","Mt. Fuji (Fujisan)",2013,{"path":206,"nameCommon":207,"region":158,"year":208},"\u002Fsites\u002Fsado-gold-mines","Sado Gold Mines",2024,{"path":154,"nameCommon":146,"region":158,"year":185},1785853967913]