山刀伐峠

A detour while traveling There is an old road (walk only) that weaves through the current road. Since it was not the season for bears, I decided to walk a bit, but considering the return, I decided not to go all the way to the top.

Docomo's mobile signal does not reach this area. There seems to be an old mountain pass road, but I'm too scared to go there. It looks like a bear will appear too.

I wanted to go through the mountain pass that appears on the narrow road in the back, so I drove there, but the north side was a series of narrow roads with ninety-nine turns, making it difficult. If an oncoming car were to come, there would be no room for them to pass each other, and the cliff was approaching. It might be fine for a motorcycle, but a car is really difficult. I felt that even now, more than 300 years have passed since Basho's time, it remains a difficult place. (There is a tunnel running under the mountain pass) There is a rather large parking lot and restroom at the top of the mountain, and the route south from there is narrow but relatively easy with many straight lines. There are large parking lots at the entrance to the mountain pass on both the north and south sides, and the south side in particular is laid out to look like a small park.

In Matsuo Basho's Oku no Hosomichi, the mountain pass is said to be the most difficult part of the Oku no Hosomichi, and is described as ``alpine forests, with no single bird singing, dark under the trees, thick ducks, and the work of walking at night.'' This is just a personal imagination with no academic basis, but it is easy to imagine that crossing mountain passes at that time would have been a steep mountain path anywhere other than the main highways, and it is not difficult to imagine that mountain passes of this level would have been difficult to cross. I imagine that it must have been rough, and that perhaps because I was a traveler, I was physically threatened and told that I should have a guide. I don't mean to deny the content, but I think it's fun to remember those days and think about these various thoughts. Now, a tunnel has opened and you can cross Santobori Pass in no time, but perhaps because it is the setting for Oku no Hosomichi, the old road remains and can be passed through except in winter. However, the Akakura side is narrow and basically you cannot pass each other, so if you are driving, it would be better to access from the Obanazawa side where the road is wider. This time, when I visited in mid-May, the Akakura side was still closed for the winter. At the pass, there is a signpost indicating Santobori Pass, a restroom, and a stall-like hut. The trail has been extended further, allowing you to reach the original mountain pass, so if you're interested, you might want to walk over it, but I'm scared of bears, so I left early. By the way, this is a complete aside, but when I visited in the summer before, there were a lot of wasps flying around, and they quickly disappeared. (They say they come closer to black things, but they also get attracted to white car bodies quite a bit.)

Prefectural Route 28, which connects Mogami Town and Obanazawa City in Yamagata Prefecture, now has the Yatobuki Tunnel, making it easy to navigate, but it used to be one of the most difficult passages. Apparently, during the Edo period, when Matsuo Basho passed through this area, he had to worry about bandits. The old road was still there, so I decided to take it. There is a parking lot near the top of the pass, and you can walk to the top from here. The [Oku-no-Hosomichi Monument] has been erected, and a passage from [Oku-no-Hosomichi] is engraved on it. I was relieved when I safely descended to the Obanazawa side. ① The roads are narrow and winding, making it difficult to drive. ② There might be a bear. ③ Traffic may be restricted in winter. (Oku no Hosomichi ⇒ Basho Seifu History Museum)