About Kijoka Nanataki Waterfall
The Kijoka Nanataki Waterfall (kijoka-nana-taki [喜如嘉七滝]; Kijoka 7 Falls; or kijoka-taki [喜如嘉滝]) strikes me as more of a locals’ waterfall given the prayer infrastructure around it.
Given this waterfall’s association with the village of Ogimi, which is informally known as the “village of longevity” (due to harboring an unusual number of people who have lived over 100 years), sacred spots like this are taken seriously.
Indeed, the spot is fronted by a torii gate (typically something that typically signifies a sacred or holy site) followed by a forking path.
The one on the right rises to a small shrine while the path on the left drops follows a stream leading to the base of the Kijoka Nanataki Waterfall.
While the name of the waterfall may imply that there’s 7 waterfalls (something I’ve come to realize is not an unusual name for Japanese waterfalls), it looked like there were only about 2 visible tiers.
There may be more hidden tiers further upstream, but given the thick foliage surrounding the area, it would likely require a drone to figure that out (though I doubt drones are appreciated in a tranquil, sacred site such as this).
![Nanataki_009_11252024 - The worshipping site (or 御嶽 [utaki] or [otake]) that was up the right fork behind the torii gate at the Kijoka Nanataki Waterfall](https://images.world-of-waterfalls.com/Nanataki_009_11252024.jpg)
From what I can tell, there hasn’t been any official measurement of this waterfall’s height, but I’ve seen an estimate of 20m, which might seem reasonable.
Anyways, this was a pretty simple waterfall to visit and revere as we only had to walk a mere 50m or so from the small car park (see directions below).
Therefore, we only spent about 30 minutes to really take in this waterfall and return to the car.
Authorities
The Kijoka Nanataki Waterfall resides near the village of Ogimi on Okinawa Island in the Okinawa Prefecture, Japan. It may be administered by the local authorities of Ogimi Village. For information or inquiries about the area as well as current conditions, you can try visiting the Okinawa Tourism website.
The Kijoka Nanataki Waterfall is located near the village of Ogimi in the north of Okinawa Island.
Since we were staying in Sesoko Island, I’ll describe how we managed to drive to the waterfall from the Hilton Okinawa Sesoko Resort.
So from the Hilton Okinawa Sesoko Resort, we drove for about 3km back towards the main island (crossing the Sesoko Bridge) to regain the National Route 449.
From there, we turned left and then turned right onto the Route 84 (either via the Route 219 or directly on the Route 84 another 1.6km later).
Once on the 84, we then drove it for about 6.4km before turning left onto the Route 123, where we took this route for nearly 4km to a three-way junction.
Turning right at this three-way junction onto the Route 505, we then followed this coastal road for a little over 6km to its junction with the National Route 58.
Then, we turned left onto the Route 58 and followed this road for 17.5km to a fork off to the right (there’s a small sign for Kijoka).
Finally, we followed the local roads with signs pointing the way to the Bashofu Center.
About 160m from where we left the Route 58, we then saw a sign for the Bashofu Center and turned right into a narrower access road, where after 150m more we encountered its car park just outside its gate.
However, instead of parking here, we drove another 400m to a fork by a pink building with a sign pointing to the right for the Nanataki Waterfall.
Finally, we took this right fork and followed this narrow, single-lane road to its end in another 300m, where there’s limited parking space for maybe a half-dozen cars max.
Overall, this drive should take about an hour, but it took us about 90 minutes because our circumstances were such that we actually had to drive here from a failed visit to Hiji Falls since it was closed during our late November 2024 visit.
For some geographical context, Ogimi was about 25km (over 30 minutes drive) northeast of Nago, about 26km (over 30 minutes drive) east of Nakijin, about 34km (about an hour drive) east of Motobu, about 74km (about 90 minutes drive) northeast of Chatan, and 93km (about 90-120 minutes drive) northeast of Naha (the difference depends on whether or not you take the toll motorway).
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Long video starting from the torii gate and ending right at the base of the falls
Downstream to upstream sweep from near the base of the waterfall
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