Shizuoka Course Overview
Shizuoka is located between Tokyo and Osaka, with an area of 7,779km2. Shizuoka Prefecture has a population of approximately 3,800,000 people. Shizuoka has about 500km of cost that includes Suruga Bay and the Sagami Sea (27).
Shizuoka is the fourth prefecture of the Tokai nature trail, and one of my favorite places in Japan. Visiting Shizuoka takes you to the ocean, mountains, forests and lakes, all which can be visited on the Tokai trail.Mt. Fuji as well as some of the Southern Alps are located in Shizuoka. Also Approximately half of all Japan's green tea is grown in Shizuoka. Depending on the season and route you take you may see tea fields while hiking.
The prefecture of Shizuoka has the best maps, and guides hands down. The Japanese website also offers accurate and easy to use maps.The main trail of the prefecture of Shizuoka was clearly marked, and was easy to follow the signs. I hiked the main trail up to Lake Tanuki, then I switched to the bypass route.. The signs were few and far between, and I did become lost pretty frequently. I would like to go back and try the bypass course again, as well as the part of the main trail I didn’t hike. The bypass course also takes you through the city, along the coast and takes you to some very beautiful parts of the seaside. The best part of the Shizuoka course is the fact that the maps show you where there are rest areas, and these rest areas are almost always great places to camp, and often offer shelter.
The Shizuoka course is the first prefecture to offer a major bypass route. The bypass route takes you along the coast, while the main trail continues one path until you meet Aichi.
The main course takes you from Tashiro Pass (田代峠) to Shizuoka / Aichi prefectural border (静岡・愛知県境) which is a large field where you can rest or campout in. The bypass course starts at Lake Tanuki (田貫湖) and meets the main course at Kurata (蔵田) bus stop.
The website guides serve as an over view of each prefectural course the Ebook goes into much more detail about each section, this is because the prefectural courses offer multiple routes.
The course overview of each prefecture shows the outline of the course, and some of the major points of interest. The Tokai trail offers many different routes, and the maps, even those on the trail, do not always show all courses. To address this issues I wrote a free guidebook that covers the complete trail.
