Oda

Ōda (大田市) is a city in Shimane. Yunotsu hot springs area in it has a separate article.

Understand
Omori Town (near Iwami Town) is a fantastic old silver mining town, which accounted for about 1/3 of the world's silver production at its peak. Omori and the surrounding area had hundreds of silver mines of various sizes.

Tourist information site
The local tourist association has a multilingual guide site.

Get in
Oda city is accessible via Odashi Station along the San-in Line. Visitors most often take a train from Izumo (¥570); however, direct trains can be taken from as far as Tottori to the east and Yamaguchi to the west.

Get around
Several buses go up the main street. There are also bicycles for rent. You pay the rental fee at the gas station across the street. You can also walk, but it is a mostly uphill walk for about 2 km from the main starting point to the main mine.

Iwami Ginzan
Iwami Ginzan (石見銀山) was one of the world's largest silver mines during the 16th and 17th centuries. At this time, one third of the world's silver came out of Japan, and Iwami Ginzan produced much of that silver, although many other mines existed. It was officially registered as a World Heritage Site in June 2007 under the name Iwami Ginzan Silver Mines and its Cultural Landscape, encompassing the mines, Omori Town, and Yunotsu.



Take a beautiful walk down the old single-street town up the hill on the way to the main mine; several old merchants homes, samurai homes and other buildings are restored. Beautiful houses. Tremendous wealth here at one time. There are several open houses along the way that you can pay to enter. You can also buy a pass that gives you admission to all of the open houses.


 * Old Court House. Now a public hall. Has a 3D display of the geography around. Very interesting. Also a recreated scene of some miscreant receiving his sentence... must've been quite a bit of crime during the silver rush.... Easy to imagine this place in the boom years - like some scene from a Western, with swordsmen instead of gunslingers.

Sleep
Hotels are scarce in the immediate Iwami Ginzan area.

Go next
By train, you can take a direct line to the following destinations:
 * Gotsu
 * Hamada
 * Masuda
 * Kawamoto
 * Misato
 * Iinan
 * Izumo
 * Matsue
 * Yonago