Kiso-Fukushima Guide: Nakasendō Checkpoint, Soba and Japanese to Use

Why Kiso-Fukushima is worth a stop on the Nakasendō

The Nakasendō, the mountain highway between Edo and Kyoto, passed through the narrow Kiso Valley for much of its length, and its eleven post towns there are known together as the Kisoji. Fukushima-juku was the fifth of them and lay roughly halfway between the two capitals, which made it an obvious place for the shogunate to control traffic. Its checkpoint, set up in the first years of the seventeenth century, was counted among the four great barriers of the Edo period.

The town also housed the Yamamura family, hereditary administrators who governed the valley and its valuable cypress forests. Their residence, part of which survives with its garden, is now a museum. Hiroshige's print of Fukushima in his Sixty-nine Stations of the Kiso Kaidō shows travellers kneeling before officials at the barrier as their papers are checked.

For a learner, Kiso-Fukushima is a working town rather than a museum piece. Shops serve local people, the soba restaurants are busy with Japanese travellers, and conversations happen naturally at counters and stations. It is a good place to practise without crowds.

Getting there: the Shinano from Nagoya

Kiso-Fukushima Station is on the JR Chūō Main Line, and limited express Shinano trains stop here. According to the local tourism bureau, the ride from Nagoya takes about an hour and twenty minutes; Matsumoto is less than an hour away in the other direction. Local trains also run along the valley, more slowly and less often, and link the town with the other post towns of the Kisoji.

From the station, the town centre and the Kiso River are a few minutes' walk downhill. The checkpoint site is at the northern end of town, about fifteen minutes on foot from the station, and Ue-no-dan is on the slope above the river. Buses run from the station to the Kaida highlands and towards Mount Ontake.

Checkpoint, Ue-no-dan and the magistrate's house: what you will see

The checkpoint site sits where the valley narrows, between the river and the mountainside, so there was no way round it. After the barrier was abolished in 1868 the buildings disappeared, but excavations in the 1970s allowed the east and west gates to be reconstructed, and a small museum displays travel permits, weapons and the tools of inspection. The site is a National Historic Site.

Ue-no-dan, the upper terrace, is the most atmospheric part of town: a few lanes of old houses with latticed fronts, a crank in the road built to slow attackers, and wooden troughs, mizuba, where mountain water runs constantly. Down by the Kiso River, a free footbath lets you soak tired feet, and the Yamamura magistrate's residence keeps part of its house and garden.

• Fukushima Sekisho: the reconstructed checkpoint gates and museum.
• Ue-no-dan: the old upper street with its stone lanes and water troughs.
• Yamamura Daikan Yashiki: the residence of the valley's hereditary administrators.
• Kōzen-ji: a Zen temple linked with the Kiso clan, known for its gardens.
• Ashiyu: a free footbath beside the Kiso River.
• Goryōkan: the former regional office of the Imperial forests, a reminder of the valley's timber wealth.

Words on the signs in Kiso-Fukushima

The word you will see most is 中山道, Nakasendō, the central mountain road, on signposts, stone markers and shop names. 関所, sekisho, is a checkpoint; the 関 is the same kanji as in 関西, Kansai, west of the barrier, and 関東, Kantō, east of it.

In the old town, 水場, mizuba, marks the water troughs, and 足湯, ashiyu, the footbath. 代官屋敷, daikan yashiki, is the residence of a daikan, a shogunate administrator, a word familiar to Japanese from period dramas.

Japanese for Kiso soba and sunki

The Kiso Valley is soba country, and new-season soba, shinsoba, is celebrated each autumn. The simplest order is zarusoba, cold noodles on a bamboo tray with a dipping sauce. In winter, look for sunki soba, hot soba topped with the local salt-free pickle, which you will find nowhere else.

At the end of the meal, many shops bring sobayu, the hot water the noodles were cooked in, to pour into the leftover dipping sauce and drink. If it does not come, you can ask.

Timing and practical tips

Kiso-Fukushima is small and easy, but trains and museum days need a little planning.

• Check the Shinano timetable for your onward train; local services along the valley are infrequent.
• The checkpoint museum and the magistrate's house close on different weekdays; check before you go.
• Wear good shoes: Ue-no-dan and the checkpoint are on slopes and steps.
• Bring a small towel for the riverside footbath.
• Winters are cold and snowy in the valley; autumn colours and the shinsoba season make October and November especially rewarding.
• Mount Ontake is an active volcano; if you plan to go up, check the eruption alert level first.

Practise ordering soba before you go

The server's suggestion, ikaga desu ka, how about it, is the polite way to offer something, and you can accept with ja, sore de onegai shimasu, then that one, please. The answer to your question explains sunki in one line: shio o tsukawanai, without using salt. Practise the four lines below until you can say them without reading.

Then practise with a partner. In Unihongo, choose the Japanese Cuisine topic and ask your AI Sensei to play a soba shop owner in the Kiso Valley, or choose Regional Dialects and ask about the way people speak in the mountains of Nagano. Saying the lines once before you go makes the real order easy.

Official information

The Kiso Ontake tourism bureau publishes sights, access times, events and Mount Ontake volcano information, and Kiso town lists the opening details of the checkpoint museum and the magistrate's house. Check both before you go.

• Kiso Ontake tourism bureau (Japanese)
• Access to Kiso (Japanese)
• Fukushima Checkpoint Museum, Kiso town (Japanese)
• Yamamura Daikan Yashiki, Kiso town (Japanese)