Karuizawa: Peak Colors

Located at the foot of Mount Asama in Nagano Prefecture, the upmarket resort town of Karuizawa takes just an hour to reach from Tokyo by Hokuriku Shinkansen and so becomes a popular getaway every year during the hot summer months and again in fall when its woody surroundings come into their autumn colors.

Checking in on several of the area's best loved leaf-viewing spots today, I found those in and around the town to be generally at their peak and likely to continue for around another week, although perhaps as a consequence of this year's long and hot summer, the colors themselves were looking rather less vibrant than in previous years. Elsewhere in spots higher up the mountainside, foliage still feels pleasantly autumnal but is beginning to look a touch past its peak.

My first stop of the day was at the Usui Pass Observation Platform, set right on the Nagano prefectural border at an elevation of around 1,200 meters, from where it offers sweeping eastward views over Gunma.

Here I found a nice mix of autumn colors including some bright reds, but overall the leaves here looked to be a couple of days more advanced than in the town, already looking a bit dry and muted with yellows turning to browns.

From the platform, a 15 minute drive brought me back downhill and into the central town area of Kyukaruizawa to the Kumobaike Pond. About 400 meters around, the pond is fed by springwater and sheltered by trees, creating a mirrorlike surface.

This was definitely the most striking spot of the day with bright flashes of yellow and red, and was already a bit crowded at the time of my visit. Despite feeling a little less intense than I've seen it in the past, the foliage immediately around the pond was right at its peak for the year and will likely look somewhere close to its best for another week.

Leaving Kyukaruizawa behind, I took another 20-minute drive north to the Shiraito Falls. On my way out of town, I made a brief stop to check out the Mikasa Hotel - a rare Western-style wooden hotel building originally constructed in 1905 and recently reopened after extensive renovation work that began in 2020.

While the hotel's exterior is its most striking feature, visitors can also find nicely preserved guestrooms and living areas alongside exhibitions about its history and some of its most famous guests.

Another of Karuizawa's popular sightseeing spots, the Shiraito Falls are unusual in that they are fed directly by groundwater, which fans out across a 70-meter stretch of rock wall forming a striking curtain of water.

Given its higher elevation a little above 1,200 meters, I wasn't surprised to find it the furthest advanced of today's spots, with just a few splashes of bright yellow breaking up otherwise brown, muted leaves and bare branches.

For my final stop of the day I took a visit to the Nakakaruizawa area, about four kilometers east of Karuizawa Station in the vicinity of Hoshino Resorts. One of Karuizawa's most consistently busy parts, the area is also home to the riverside Harunire Terrace development, the Karuizawa Wild Bird Sanctuary and a hot spring facility, also operated by Hoshino Resorts.

Although pleasantly leafy, colors in the area immediately around Harunire Terrace, with colors already looking a little faded and dull. Better scenes were to be found close to the nearby Hoshino Resorts Bleston Court Hotel property, and around the two showpiece churches - the Karuizawa Kogen Church and Stone Church.