Kyoto Prefecture travel guides

Everything you need to walk or cycle the Amanohashidate sandbar — route length, bike hire costs, what to find among 8,000 pine trees, and the freshwater spring that wells up from the sea.

Discover the two hilltop viewpoints above Amanohashidate — View Land and Kasamatsu Park — plus the matanozoki ritual that turns Japan's famous sandbar into a bridge to heaven.

Plan your trip by season: when cherry blossoms line the sandbar, when the beach opens, when autumn foliage peaks at the viewpoints, and which weekday mornings offer the calmest crowds and clearest skies.

Discover Chion-ji Temple at the south end of Amanohashidate — one of Japan's three great Monju wisdom temples, home to the Chie-no-wa lantern, fan-shaped omikuji, and an Important Cultural Property Tahoto pagoda. Free to enter.

Ride the cablecar to Kasamatsu Park — the hillside viewpoint on Amanohashidate's north side where the matanozoki tradition was born — and look through your legs to see the sandbar soar into the sky as a bridge to heaven.