A weeklong road trip across under-the-radar Shikoku reveals an island whose diverse landscapes are complemented by an easygoing vibe and rich connections to the past.

Photographs by Marta Giaccone

*Left to right:* On the grounds of Kochi’s Zenraku Temple; an elderly couple in Matsuyama.

It’s not easy to hit the road when you’re already in one of the world’s most spectacular places. Deep in the mountainous heart of Shikoku, the Iya Valley is a pristine gem, its forested slopes rising steeply above a jade-colored river crossed by homespun vine bridges. I have been roosting here for the past several days with my old friend Mason Florence, an American photojournalist and former Japan Times reporter who authored some of the original Lonely Planet guides to Japan. Mason first visited Shikoku more than a quarter century ago and returns regularly to the Iya Valley, where he keeps the hand-built wooden cabin we’re staying at. With his deep knowledge of local culture and food- ways, he’s the ideal guide for a road-tripping adventure across the smallest and least spoiled of Japan’s main islands.

We have already driven around much of Kochi, largest of the island’s four prefectures. The region tumbles down from a central mountain range to subtropical flatlands and an arcing coastline bookended by the craggy capes of Muroto and Ashizuri, where Hiroshige-style waves crash against granite cliffs. Kochi, the prefecture’s namesake capital, is also one of Japan’s great food cities. More than 20 types of citrus (especially yuzu) are grown in orchards around here, and the local specialty of katsuo-no-tataki—luscious hunks of skipjack tuna seared over straw fires—is a revelation. Brimming with produce and snacks, the buzzing Sunday street market is said to be the oldest in Japan, with roots dating back to the 17th century.

The Iya Valley, remote and gorgeous, feels like a distinct, star-dappled world of its own. But cabin fever has descended upon our lair and it’s time to move on. Climbing back into Mason’s kei car—the compact cubic van favored by locals—we descend along twisting roads to the north coast. One of the first attractions we encounter is the Zenigata Sand Coin, a great swath of white sand raked into the shape of an immense piece of 17th-century pocket change; another is Chichibugahama, a.k.a. Sunset Beach, where selfie-snapping crowds gather for pictures around mirror-like tide pools. From there, we drive eastward through Takamatsu, the coastal capital of Kagawa Prefecture, and up to the plateau of Yashima, a flat-topped mountain that rises some 300 meters above the isle-studded Seto Inland Sea. Our hotel for the night is set along a paved walking path that circles the heights. With its parklike set- ting and sweeping views, the area is another breathtaking surprise, and one far enough off the tourist circuit to be shared with but a few discreet locals.

The next morning, we head down to Mure on the outskirts of Takamatsu. The stone-cutting town is notable as the onetime home of Japanese-American sculptor Isamu Noguchi, who stayed here for five months of each of the last 15 years of his life. His former studio has since been preserved as the Isamu Noguchi Garden Museum, where dozens of the artist’s granite and basalt sculptures are displayed in an outdoor arrangement that fuses playful symbolism with the eternal.

For a lunch pit stop, Mason brings me to Waraya, a popular thatch-roofed restaurant that specializes in Kagawa’s hallowed sanuki udon. We sit among tour groups who expertly slurp snow-white noodles out of small wooden tubs called tarai. Like so much of the food we eat in Shikoku, they’re as earnestly made as they are satisfying.

National Route 11 brings us eastward into the neighboring prefecture of Tokushima, hugging the shores of the Seto Inland Sea right up to the suspension bridge that connects Shikoku with Awaji Island and thence with mainland Honshu. Done for the day, we check in to a seaside hotel overlooking the Naruto whirlpools, a tidal phenomenon that churns away in the narrow strait below the bridge.

The surprises continue on day three. Inland from Naruto Port is the German House, a Teutonesque pile of a museum dedicated to the German POWs who were interned nearby during World War I. By all accounts, the prisoners enjoyed a friendly relationship with the locals, teaching them everything from banking to Beethoven; the on-site café even serves sauerkraut. A 10-minute drive south across the Yoshino River, it’s a very different scene in Aizumi, once a center of indigo growing. At a dye facility and shop called Aiyashiki Okumura, I create my own blue-splattered handkerchief through hands-on dipping.

Our day ends at Tokushima City, an unremarkable prefectural capital that proves to be a cultural storehouse. At dinner we meet up with Don Weiss, a retired Californian and longtime resident who happens to be an authority on the famed 88 Temple Pilgrimage, a 1,200-kilometer walking route that loops around the island. Over tacos, he invites us to join him on an introductory trek the next morning.

The pilgrimage path begins just north of the Yoshino River at Ryozen-ji, whose garden and pagoda are lovely but secondary to the temple’s role as a supply station for all-white henro (pilgrim) outfits, books for souvenir stamps, and merch extolling the wandering ninth-century Buddhist sage Kobo Daishi’s sacred route turned industry. At temple number two, Gokuraku-ji, we admire an ancient cedar said to have been planted by Kobo Daishi himself; in a wooded vale an hour’s walk away, Dainichi-ji stands out for its 33 statuettes of Kannon, the bodhisattva of compassion. While many elderly henro show astounding stamina, Weiss concedes that not all modern-day “pilgrims” follow the path of austerity and discipline, choosing to tackle the route by taxi or coach and to stay at deluxe inns rather than spartan temple lodgings or dorms. He shrugs. “People chart their own course, and devotion is up to each of us to find in our hearts.”

Back in Tokushima that evening, we attend a show at the Awa Jurobe Yashiki Puppet Theater, where heartrending legends are enacted by black-cloaked puppeteers to the strains of a shamisen. Bunraku is a form of traditional puppetry that originated in 17th-century Osaka and remains particularly popular in this part of Shikoku. As a post-show treat, Mason and I are invited to the home of a female bunraku master, who mounts a private demonstration of puppetry performances still taken on the road each New Year to bless farmers’ crops.

Locally grown hassaku oranges for sale at a roadside stall; pilgrims on the steps to Dainichi Temple in Kochi Prefecture. — *Left to right:* Locally grown *hassaku* oranges for sale at a roadside stall; pilgrims on the steps to Dainichi Temple in Kochi Prefecture.

The last prefecture on our list, Ehime, covers the northwestern part of Shikoku. It’s a good three hours’ drive across the island from Tokushima to the city of Matsuyama, which sprawls beneath the island’s loftiest castle, a 17th-century stronghold now accessible by ropeway or chairlift. Tourists gravitate toward the automaton clock near Dogo Onsen Honkan, Japan’s baroque dowager of a bathhouse, which is said to be an inspiration for Hayao Miyazaki’s animated fantasy Spirited Away.

Nearby Iyo was the home of environmental guru Masanobu Fukuoka, whose 1975 manifesto on natural farming, The One-Straw Revolution, remains something of a classic in permaculture and organic gardening circles. Today, his grandson Hiroki maintains the family’s hilltop orchards—Masanobu Fukuoka Natural Farm—where we watch international volunteers plucking amanatsu, a grapefruit-size citrus cultivated in wild undergrowth with minimal human intervention.

Day six sees us roll into Uchiko, a historic candle-making town whose old quarter is lined with elegant merchant houses built during the wax trade’s boom days. After lunch at a tempura joint run by a wizened fry master who plies his patrons with jokes, sake, and Suntory, we follow a mountain road up through deep forest, hairpin bends testing our kei car’s nimbleness. Beyond the timberline lies yet another wonder: the rolling Tengu Highlands, where black- and-white cattle graze unperturbed by the toothlike nubs of limestone that dot the slopes. Viewpoints reveal staggered rows of cascading peaks.

After such rugged driving, our lodgings that night are especially welcome: a private cottage at a hot-spring hotel perched above the Nakatsu Gorge. The next morning, we enjoy muscle-melting baths before setting off on foot along zigzagging board- walks that follow the course of the Niyodo River, its waters a deep turquoise hue. Waterfalls plunge over boulders placed perfectly as though by some Kurosawa set designer.

We return to the Iya Valley in a van overloaded with stacks of brochures, homemade sake gift boxes, and mottled yet perfumed citrus fruits. Yuzu, anyone? Unobscured by mobs or vending machines or over-formality, this mellow—dare I say magical?—island seems a kind of final frontier, Japan with its pressure released from the bottle. Mason says it best: “Shikoku is a place that’s too good to share—but too good not to share.”

Pacific waves wash against a granite cliff at Cape Ashizuri, the southernmost point of Shikoku.

Shikoku Made Simple

GETTING THERE

HK Express is one of the few international airlines that flies to Shikoku’s Takamatsu Airport, though there are multiple daily flights from Tokyo as well as an overnight train service called the Sunrise Seto.

WHERE TO STAY

Tougenkyo-Iya
A collection of nicely refurbished farmhouses on the slopes of Iya Valley’s Ochiai village (from US$110 per person a night, self-catering).

Hotel Boukaiso
Set atop Mount Yashima, rooms here command stunning views of the Seto Inland Sea (from US$60 a night).

Naruto Kaigetsu
A good choice for front-row views of Naruto’s whirlpools (65-7 Fukuike, Naruto; from US$100 a night).

Daiwa Roynet Hotel Tokushima-Ekimae
A decent business hotel across the tracks from Tokushima Central Park (from US$65 a night).

Dogo Onsen Funaya
Matsuyama’s oldest ryokan comes with communal hot spring baths (from US$275 a night).

Nakatsu Gorge Yunomori
Perched above the Nakatsu River in the mountains of Kochi, this hot-spring hotel is as soothing as it is scenic (from US$220 a night).

This article originally appeared in the June/July 2025 print issue of DestinAsian magazine (“Surprises at Every Turn”). Buy a single issue or subscribe here.

How to Explore Shikoku on Four Wheels

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