To Inome

After leaving Onamuchi's shrine the narrow road continues to wind steeply up the mountainside. I love walking these roads as they are more like wide asphalted hiking trails with very little traffic, maybe 1 or 2 vehicles an hour and they usually being Post Office or delivery vans.

At the pass the road forks and I take the right-hand one, the road less travelled, and now I enjoy the road even more as it descends. geologically speaking japan is a very new land, so erosion has not smoothed out the mountains and so they are still steep.  The only sound is of rushing water on its way to the Japan sea a few kilometers downhill

Approaching the village of Inome, it was mostly tea in the fields. Inome means "Wild Boar Eye" and refers to a nearby sea cave that is shaped like a wild boars eye. According to the Izumo Fudoki dreaming of this cave was a portent of your imminent death. The cave is also considered to be one of several entrances to Yomi, the underworld, the most famous one being the one used by Izanagi

Tea does not need flat land to be grown, which suggests that these were once rice-paddies. There was no-one on the street of the village who I could ask.

In the middle of the village the Otoshi Shrine with its unusual double honden