{"id":1645,"date":"2026-09-13T16:35:16","date_gmt":"2026-09-13T07:35:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/partha.jp\/index.htm\/?p=1645"},"modified":"2026-09-13T16:35:17","modified_gmt":"2026-09-13T07:35:17","slug":"oh-dam-river-country-in-the-golden-week-chichibu-%e7%a7%a9%e7%88%b6","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/partha.jp\/index.htm\/oh-dam-river-country-in-the-golden-week-chichibu-%e7%a7%a9%e7%88%b6\/","title":{"rendered":"Oh Dam- River Country in the Golden Week Chichibu \u79e9\u7236"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\n \t<\/i> Read Time:<\/span>8 Minute, 20 Second <\/div>\n\n <\/div>\n

Inspiration often comes out of desperation, mine came from a trip cancelled on the last day and the lack of options for making another reservation to replace the cancelled one.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Adding context, the Golden Week in Japan are seven days, sometimes in the same week, but mostly traversing two weeks with four public holidays thrown in. When you combine the inevitable weekend, there are around five holidays during these days and some companies give their employees the rest of the days off.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Golden Week in 2026, started on April 29, a Wednesday, Thursday and Friday were working days, followed by a rather long weekend that lasted till May 6th. My original plan was to travel to Yamagata prefecture, an Airbnb was booked and I was planning to watch the \u2018Submerged Forest\u2019, in the Shirakawa Lake close to the Iide town.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I made my reservation in early April, but an an unexpected trip to Bangkok came up in late April. I looked at the dates of the Bangkok event and decided that I would arrive in Tokyo on the night of the 28th, just enough time to recover from the trip and drive to Yamagata on the 29th morning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is a 400 kilometre drive, the Golden Week traffic would add a few hours to the 5-6 hours drive. Rest and sleep were important and an overnight in Tokyo seemed just sufficient.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I came down with a cold on the 27th, my flight from Bangkok on the 28th got delayed, I missed a connecting flight which resulted in an arrival into Tokyo on the morning of the 29th.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There are perfect plans and there are perfect conditions for plans to fail and these perfect conditions resulted in the Yamagata trip getting cancelled and I was in Tokyo with no plans for the Golden Week.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was almost impossible to get a hotel or Airbnb at an affordable price so we settled for a day trip and starting exploring different options.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Saitama prefecture is located next to Tokyo, the Chichibu are has forest and mountains and is within a two hour drive from Tokyo. I have taken a few trip to Chichibu over the last few years, there have been day trip and occasionally I found quaint Airbnbs to stay over.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Chichibu City<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The Choco Tabi\u3000Saitama \u3061\u3087\u3053\u305f\u3073\u57fc\u7389, or quick trip Saitama website gives a few model courses, I remembered on of them was for a dam tour and decided to follow the course as it had enough options to take up a whole day.
https:\/\/chocotabi-saitama.jp\/modelcourse\/6713\/<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

We started early on the morning of May 2nd, Golden Week traffic was an eventuality that we were ready for. The expectation was the two hour drive would take around three hours and we would be at the first dam by 10 AM.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The traffic was worse than expected, the first 20 kilometres took an hour, the next seventy took two hours and by the time we got off the highway at the Hanazono Interchange, we had been driving for more than three hours. The traffic from the Hanazono interchange was comparatively lighter and it was another hour before we reached the first stop, the Kakkaku Dam \u5408\u89d2\u30c0\u30e0.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There is a free parking spot, a few cars were already parked, when we arrived. There are toilets at the parking area along with a Soba restaurant. We walked across the roadway of the dam, the gravity dam impounds the Yoshida river and creates the Nishi Chichibu Momoji reservoir, also known as the Lake Nishi Chichibu.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u5408\u89d2\u30c0\u30e0 Kakkaku Dam Reservoir<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

\u3000It was a late spring sunny morning, warm enough to make the walk pleasant, a breeze blew across the river catching us on top of the dam. Bridges across the river are visible from the roadway, we walked to the end of the dam structure along the river to watch boats in the reservoir.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A few fishermen, possibly hobbyists, their miniature silhouettes visible from the distance, there was no hurry in their actions. There were signs around the dam prohibiting fishing, apparently this wasn\u2019t taken too seriously.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Choco Saitama website mentioned a Kakkaku dam curry at a restaurant that was around a ten minute drive from the dam structure, however the Soba restaurant \u305d\u3070\u51e6\u5408\u89d2, Sobasho Kakkaku, offered a vegetarian \u68ee\u305d\u3070\u3000Mori Soba.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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partha.jp<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The owners were a pleasant middle aged couple, who took our orders, asked where were from and bought out the Soba meal set in around 15 minutes. This obviously is not popular tourist spot for people coming from far, most of the customers at the restaurant seemed to be locals.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We finished out lunch, said our Thank Yous and Good Byes and headed for the next stop, the Urayama Dam.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is around 30 minute drive to the Urayama dam, taking us through the mountain roads. The parking is at a lower level, so the you need to drive downhill for a few metres.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The weather had turned cloudy and a light showers erupted as we parked. We waited for a few minutes for the showers to abate before getting down and walking across to the dam structure.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Urayama dam has one of the highest dam walls in Japan and the roadway on top of the dam offers a view of the Chichibu town. There is a \u2018Disaster Prevention Information Center\u2019 that gives information about the dam and the building houses a restaurant serving the famous \u2018Dam Curry\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u88cf\u5c71\u30c0\u30e0\u3000Urayama Dam<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

We had finished our lunch, however the restaurant had closed for the day by 14:30 when we got there. We walked around the roadway, took the elevator to descend to the lower level and watch the dam walls, the height clearly appreciable from the upward view.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The Dam Reservoir<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

It was getting to be late afternoon and we had two more dams to cover so without lingering around too much we headed back to the car park and made our way to the third spot on our itinerary, the Takizawa Dam.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The route follows the National Road No 4, with it\u2019s winding mountain roads, taking us over the scenic Raiden Todoroki Bridge or the loop bridge, we pass a short tunnel and then take a sharp right to descend into the parking spot.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There is a parking spot close to the bridge offering a panoramic view of the mountains, the river and the lake around the dam.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u6edd\u6ca2\u30c0\u30e0\u3000Takizawa Dam <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The rain had started again and increased its intensity and we decided to wait in the car till it let up. A smaller car parked next to us, the two ladies in the car were more adventurous, taking out their umbrellas and heading to explore the dam.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It took us another ten minutes before we got out of the car, and we could see the ladies at a higher vantage point along the highway. There is an elevator that descends to a square at the bottom of the bridge, there is parking at the square and a narrow road leading up to it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There is a short descent from the elevators to the square over the descending step, large fans blow air over the visitors, the atmosphere decidedly cooler than the outside.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A suspension bridge hangs over the reservoir, we were the only people around the bridge and it swayed lightly under our weight as we walked across and back.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The Loop Bridge<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The adventurous can take the stairs back to the top of the dam roadway, we chose to take the elevators, ascending the steps to reach the elevator entrance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was already 16:30 and we had another dam to cover, not wanting to reach in fading light, we made our way to the last stop , the Futase dam. There was another 20 minute drive ahead of us, the road leading us past the loop bridge and the parking area for taking pictures.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The map on the car navigation as well the Google Maps pointed to a parking spot which we assumed was the dam entrance. However the pictures on the Chocotabi Saitama site did not match-up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Another view of the Loop Bridge<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

After parking we walked across, the dam was visible, however the view seemed a bit different. We tried to explore the area on foot, however there was traffic on the National Road, the Mitsumine shrine is close by.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We spent sometime walking around and taking pictures, the parking was almost deserted at the evening hour, there was a toilet and a few vending machines nearby. There was a shop selling Sake and snacks on the opposite side but was closed at this hour.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Parking Area near the Futase Dam<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

We got back in the car and decided to head back, the car navigation pointed us to a much longe route. The traffic lights as we hit the National Road took a long time to turn green, the priority seemed to be to the road heading to the nearby shrine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u4e8c\u702c\u30c0\u30e0\u3000Futase Dam<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Our road turned out to be extremely narrow, just enough space at points to let a single car through, we waited at a few turns for the car in the opposite lane to pass before moving ahead and we discovered the spot shown on the website lay ahead of the traffic lights!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We drove around 350 kms that day, the longest drive was the one getting out of Tokyo, the rest of the trip had regular stops. There was delicious local food and just enough human interaction to feel comfortable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is not a trip for those who like open green spaces, beautiful reservoirs and for this time of the year, clear sunny days with a nip of occasional cold. There are comfortable leisurely drives along the mountains of Chichibu, the only irritant on this trip was the traffic leading out of Tokyo.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you like long drives, uncrowded places and a love for the countryside, this is a trip for you!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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