Aizu · Lake InawashiroNo.1105★★Open in map →

Lake Inawashiro

natureOff the trail — and worth it

A wide, clear lake below Mount Bandai in the middle of Aizu, ringed by named beaches. At Nagahama on the northwest shore it has a proper landing — open frontage, free car park, boat pier — with a former imperial villa on the slope behind.

FromKoriyama Station
~50 minJR line, then a local bus
Get off atNagahama bus stop (local bus from Inawashiro Stn)
From there
Lake Inawashiro

Directions ↗

The sweet spot

This is a headline sight of Fukushima and the shore fills in summer, so it is not a secret. What gets missed is the shape of a visit. Most people take the lake as scenery — a flash of blue from the Ban'etsu West Line, or a photo stop off the expressway — and never put their feet on the shore. And almost nobody plans for the cold half of the year, which is when the birds are here.

Where it is

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What to look for — in walking order

Nagahama cruise pierブルーノ・プラス / CC BY-SA 3.0

The Nagahama frontagean open shore on Route 49, with a free prefectural car park directly behind it
The cruise pierthe landing for the swan-shaped and turtle-shaped sightseeing boats working this shore
Okinajimathe small wooded island lying offshore from this stretch of the northwest shore
Tenkyokakua white timber villa on the rise behind the shore, its rooms open to visitors

How to actually get there

Koriyama Station → Inawashiro Station (JR Ban'etsu West Line, about 35 minutes).
Inawashiro Station → Nagahama (local bus, about 15 minutes; the stop is on Route 49 at the shore).
Walk the frontage to the boat pier, then take the signed slope behind it up to Tenkyokaku.

JR Ban'etsu West Line from Koriyama, then a local bus: Koriyama Station →(JR Ban'etsu West Line, about 35 minutes)→ Inawashiro Station, then a local bus of about 15 minutes to the Nagahama stop on Route 49. Koriyama is the Tohoku Shinkansen station for this side of Fukushima, so from Tokyo it is one change. Buses along the lake are not frequent, so check the next departure at the station before you set out.
Back to Inawashiro Station: Take the bus from the Nagahama stop back to Inawashiro Station and pick up the Ban'etsu West Line for Koriyama, or ride it the other way to Aizu-Wakamatsu, which is about the same distance. Check the last bus at the stop when you arrive — services along this shore are limited, and the walk back to the station is not a short one.

Directions from my location (Google Maps) ↗

About the place

Lake Inawashiro fills a broad basin south of Mount Bandai, in the middle of the Aizu region. At about 103 square kilometres it is the fourth largest lake in Japan, and the water is unusually clear. The northwest shore at Nagahama is the part set up for visitors, sitting on Route 49 with the mountain standing across the water. Swans and ducks come down from Siberia to winter here, and this shore is one of the places they gather. The rest of the shoreline runs as a chain of named beaches — Shidahama, Tenjinhama, Jokohama and the others.

How to enjoy it

Two hours covers Nagahama properly: the frontage and the pier first, then the slope behind for Tenkyokaku, whose rooms are open to visitors. If the sightseeing boats are running, they leave from that same pier. Build the day around the bus times rather than the other way round — the shore itself has no timetable at all.

Background & history

The clear water gave the lake a second, older name: Tenkyoko, the mirror of heaven. The same image was set on its shore in 1908, when Prince Arisugawa Takehito completed a summer villa on the rise above Nagahama — a white timber house with Western rooms and Japanese ones. The crown prince who would become Emperor Taisho visited that September and named it Tenkyokaku, after a line by the Tang poet Li Bai about a bright lake letting fall the mirror of heaven. The main house, its annex and its front gate were designated Important Cultural Properties in 1979.

Before you go

Cash: The shore and the prefectural car park at Nagahama are free to use. The sightseeing boat and Tenkyokaku each charge their own admission, and the seasonal loop bus sells single rides as well as a one-day pass. Fares and admissions are best confirmed on the day.
Good to know: The shore has no gate and no closing time. Winter is the season the birds are here, but the frontage is fully exposed to the wind off the water and is colder than the town behind it. The sightseeing boat and the loop bus each keep their own season, and the villa keeps its own hours.
Another way: In the warmer half of the year a weekend and holiday loop bus runs from Inawashiro Station around the town's sights — the Noguchi Hideyo Memorial Hall, Nagahama, Tenkyokaku, Hanitsu Shrine — and a one-day pass makes it the easiest way to string them together. From the Aizu side, Aizu-Wakamatsu Station is on the same line in the other direction.
After you get off: The Nagahama stop is on Route 49 at the water's edge, with the free prefectural car park immediately behind it. The boat pier is a couple of minutes along the frontage, and the slope up to Tenkyokaku is signposted from the same car park.