Tadake Falls

It may have been November, but we set out to hike up a river to Tadake Falls. It took us a couple of wrong turns and my husband having to ask 3 different Japanese people in Japanese how to get to the falls, but we eventually found it. And it was so worth it. This hike is kind of off the beaten trail, literally. You have to walk through a river, over slippery rocks, fallen logs and haul yourself up over big hills or rocks with the help of ropes. This may have been my favorite hike of all time... not that I'm an expert at hikes by any means, but I loved this one particularly. We don't really have a fall season here, but there is a change in the weather and we even got to see some fallen red and yellow fall leaves. This made me way more excited than it probably should have. Oh, the simple things in life.


The hike out to the waterfall was very enjoyable. The water was chilly and I would not have wanted to put my whole body in it, but my feet and legs got used to it pretty fast and the hiking kept me warm. We did pass a couple of people, but the river was quiet and very relaxing.

The waterfall itself is very impressive. If it were warmer we could have swam in the waterfall pool. The other waterfalls we've hiked to have all been roped off so that you couldn't get close, but this one was totally open and you could do as you pleased.
We stopped and had our picnic lunch on a log next to the water. There were some Japanese people there who made a swing and were very intertaining to watch.

After lunch we decided to take the trail up to the top of the falls. This isn't as much as a hiking trail as it was rock climbing. Yikes. I've never been on a hike like this! We had to use ropes to help us up the mountian side and it was pretty challenging. The trail eventually wound us around to the top of the falls and again it was worth the effort. This was my favorite part of the trip. It was a little oasis up there. So quiet and peaceful. We stayed for awhile and just took it all in.

I would definatly reccomend this hike and I will be looking forward to doing this again once the weather warms back up.