Wakayama Japan Travel Guide: Kumano Kodo, Nachi Falls, Shirahama & Things to Do (2026)
Wakayama Prefecture, occupying the southern tip of the Kii Peninsula in the Kansai region of Japan, is one of the country’s most spiritually and scenically extraordinary destinations — and one of the most dramatically undervisited. Home to the Kumano Kodo, a network of ancient pilgrimage trails that crisscross the Kii mountains and have been continuously walked by devotees for over a thousand years, Wakayama is a UNESCO World Heritage Site of exceptional scale and depth. But the prefecture offers far more than its famous pilgrimage route: the white sand beach and hot springs of Shirahama resort town, the vertiginous Nachi […]