Shimanto Town

Boys' talk got koinobori across a river.

Koinobori river crossing, Toka

Photo by r18 INO (PACHIMO) (CC BY 3.0)

01 ／ Mountain farmhouse

Its walls are made of thatch,with no wall clay used at all.

The Former Takeuchi Family Residence is a thatched farmhouse moved from Morigauchi in Nakatsugawa, in the former Taisho Town. The town says its walls are thatch with no wall clay at all, and that three mulberry pillars are used. Set in a reserved forest where 21 kinds of trees, including pine, cedar and cypress, were off limits, it was built of oak, chestnut, mulberry and other miscellaneous woods.

Important Cultural Property (designated 1972)
10.6 m long, 5.2 m deep (Agency for Cultural Affairs)
21 protected tree species (town)
Three mulberry pillars (town)

02 ／ Chinkabashi (submersible bridge)

Among the submersible bridges of the Shimanto River basin,it is recorded as the oldest surviving.

Its name comes from how it dips under the water when the river is high. According to the town, the riverbed rock is deep at the center, so it was built on mokko-shizumi (a bed of packed split stones), and the newly finished center section was washed away by a flood. The town's 2012 landscape page states that it is closed to traffic because of age.

Built in 1935
Registered Tangible Cultural Property (registered 2000)
61 m long, 2.5 m wide (Agency for Cultural Affairs)
Reinforced-concrete girder bridge with nine spans

03 ／ Kagura

Studied for two days at the Kakehashi house in Yusuhara,it began with notes on explanations written in ash.

A kagura passed down by the Hirano family, Shinto priests of Kubokawa in Towa. The prefecture's document records that in 1854 Hirano Seiki visited the Kakehashi house in Yusuhara, learned the heibai and niten dances in two days, and wrote down the explanations given by writing in the hearth ash. It is offered at Hoshi Shrine.

One of the nationally designated "Tosa Kagura" (Important Intangible Folk Cultural Property, designated 1980)
Transmitted in the first year of Ansei (1854)
Offered at Hoshi Shrine

Living here

87% of the total area is woodland.It lies in the middle reaches of the Shimanto River.

about 20,000 people
Rural district town

Located in Takaoka District, Kochi, it was formed in 2006 by the merger of Kubokawa, Taisho and Towa. Its southeast faces Tosa Bay. The total area is 642.28 km2, of which 87.1% is woodland and 6.0% is farmland. On the Konan Plateau (高南台地) in the east, about 2,000 ha of farmland spreads out.

People living here: 15,607people
Area: 642.28km²
Households: 7,150households
Rent (average for rentals): 34,829yen
Healthcare: 2 hospitals ／ 10 clinics

Area and habitable land at the same scalee-Stat B1101 / B1103

Children waiting for childcare: —11 nurseries and similar
Home purchase subsidy: —
Average annual temperature: —

These 3 items are waiting on a nationwide data source. We do not fill them with estimates.

ACCESS

Where you can go from here.

Shimanto Town in Japan33.212°N 133.137°E

to OsakaOvernight bus405min
to SannomiyaOvernight bus351min

Travel times follow 高知西南交通・近鉄バス共同運行『しまんとブルーライナー』（京都・大阪・神戸〜中村・宿毛）の時刻表（高知西南交通公式『2026年6月1日からの時刻表』・近鉄バス公式の路線詳細も同じ時刻）。下り（神戸・大阪・京都→宿毛・中村）：京都駅八条口 21:00発、あべの橋 22:15、なんば湊町BT 22:35、梅田 22:55発、三宮バスターミナル 23:49発 → 須崎西崎町 4:54、中土佐インター口 5:07、窪川駅前 5:40着。上り（宿毛・中村→神戸・大阪・京都）：窪川駅前 22:23発 → 三宮バスターミナル 4:59着、梅田 5:53着、京都駅八条口 7:45着 (checked 2026-09-30). They vary by time of day.

Shape

Borders 7 municipalities across 1 prefectures.

Territory of Shimanto Town

Boundaries: National Land Numerical Information (N03)

North to south

26.5km

Kochi Prefecture: 四万十市, 中土佐町, 黒潮町, 檮原町, 津野町
Ehime Prefecture: 鬼北町, 松野町

Shimanto Town isthis kind of town.

01Toka's "Koinobori River Crossing" (こいのぼりの川渡し) strings carp streamers across the Shimanto River. According to the town, it began in 1974 with about 50 streamers, and now 500 or more swim over the river from April to May. In 1997, 200 streamers were also flown over the Niagara River.
02Iwamoto-ji in Kubokawa is Temple 37 of the Shikoku 88-temple pilgrimage, and the ceiling of its main hall's inner sanctuary is filled with 575 pictures gathered by public call when the hall was rebuilt in 1978. In Ittohyo (一斗俵), there is a waterway tunnel dug by Nomura Shigemitsu, who sold his forest and fields to pay for it after the great flood of 1890.
03A town of Takaoka District formed in 2006 by the merger of Kubokawa, Taisho and Towa, with the Shimanto River winding through its middle reaches. Kubokawa in the east is the birthplace of Tani Tateki, and on the coast of Kozuru in the southeast lies the Okitsu melange, a national natural monument.

If something caught your eye, ask the town itself.

Shimanto Town official site ↗Wikipedia ↗