Japan’s autumn color, from the record

Karasawa, 2019–2025

The Karasawa Hyutte, a mountain hut at 2,300 meters in the Japan Alps, posts a dated note on the color most days through the season and keeps the archive year by year. That is 96 dated notes. Below, the first day it called any part of the bowl at its best, the first day it said so without qualifying it, and the day it stopped posting.

This season: the hut has posted 15 reports, the latest on 11 October 2026. It first called the whole bowl at its best on 1 October 2026.

In all seven years the hut first called the whole bowl at its best between 30 September and 3 October. Seven autumns, four days. Patches show up earlier and the spread there is wider, which is why the two columns are separate.

We cannot tell you when it ended. The hut stops posting when its season closes, so the record runs out before the color does. In four of the seven years it never said the color was past; in the other three it did, and two of those were its last post of the year, the remaining one the day before. Read the last column as the end of the reporting, not the end of the leaves.

What that leaves you with: 3 October to 10 October sits inside the reported season in every one of the seven years, which is the narrowest claim the record supports and the only one worth booking on. Source: Karasawa Hyutte, autumn color reports · our other long-term records · the scene itself.

Oku-Nikko, 2010–2025

Oku-Nikko is the high country of lakes and marshes above the shrines of Nikko, north of Tokyo. The Nikko Yumoto Visitor Center, run there for the Ministry of the Environment, posts a photo and a line or two about each place through the season and keeps every year online: 1,640 posts, from the autumn of 2010 to 1 October 2026. Below, the first day each year it called each of five things at its best, migoro (見頃): three places, and the grass and the larches on the Senjogahara and Odashirogahara marshes. The grass, which turns red-brown, usually comes first; the larches and Lake Chuzenji, the big lake lower down, come last.

This season: when we last read its pages, on 3 October 2026, the center had called the marsh grass at its best on 30 September, and nothing else yet. We read them by hand, not every day.

In the fifteen years the center gave Lake Yunoko a date (every year but 2014), that date fell between 9 and 20 October. Lower down is not always later: Ryuzu Falls, lower in the valley than Lake Yunoko, came before it in five of the twelve years with a date for both.

A dash means the center did not call that place at its best that year: it did not use the word, used it only to say the color was still to come or had passed, or said only part of the place was at its best. On the marshes a post also has to name the grass or the larches. The center posts every few days, so in a year with a gap the real start may be earlier. Marsh grass is Senjogahara or Odashirogahara; Lake Chuzenji is photographed from a different shore in different years. These are first days, not the height of the color: in 2025 the center first called Lake Chuzenji at its best on 26 October and was still saying so on 3 November. The bottom row is the middle date in each column, over the years that column has a date; it is not an expected date. Source: Nikko Yumoto Visitor Center, autumn color pages (in Japanese) · every post and our reading of it · the scene itself.

Where the leaves turn, in the order they turn

24 of the 73 published scenes name autumn color as a reason to come on their own page. Here they are north to south and high to low, which is roughly the order the color arrives. A scene missing from this list has not been recorded as an autumn scene, which is not the same as having no color.

• No.12
  AsahidakeHokkaido Mid-September, for about two weeks

  The tundra above the ropeway, rust and gold before a maple has turned anywhere else.

  Japan's autumn starts here. The lower forest follows in early October. The ropeway closes for maintenance in parts of November and December.

• No.31
  OzegaharaGunma / Fukushima From about 20 September, at full strength in early October

  Kusamomiji, grass autumn: the marsh itself turning, not the trees.

  You walk in for an hour and back up in an hour and a half. The shuttle buses stop on 3 November and the huts shut.

• No.23
  Karasawa CirqueNagano 1 to 10 October

  Rowan, which Americans call mountain ash, and birch in a glacial bowl at 2,300 meters, with the dwarf pine staying green.

  This is the scene in the Karasawa table above, year by year. Seven years of the hut's own reports, and the color was out across the whole bowl by 3 October in every one of them.

• No.61
  Oku-NikkoTochigi Late September to early November

  Three steps: the grass on the Senjogahara marsh, then the trees round Lake Yunoko and the falls, then the larches and Lake Chuzenji.

  The Oku-Nikko table above is this scene, year by year. On autumn weekends the bus up the Irohazaka, the hairpin road from Nikko, can take hours.

• No.25
  Nyuto OnsenAkita Mid to late October

  Beech, starting at Kuroyu and rolling down the valley to Tsurunoyu.

  All seven baths stay open until Kuroyu shuts in early November. By mid-November the color has gone and the snow has arrived.

• No.11
  Oirase GorgeAomori Late October, finished early in November

  Beech, maple and katsura over fourteen kilometers of stream.

  The road runs beside the path for most of those fourteen kilometers, and in peak week it has traffic on it. The bus stops running in mid-November.

• No.27
  Tadami LineFukushima Late October, with late color and first snow in November

  The gorge around the first bridge.

  Three trains run the whole line each day, and between 9:17 and 13:05 nothing crosses the bridge at all. The viewpoint is a climb from the road.

• No.47
  OsorezanAomori Late October, and then the gate shuts

  The crater slopes, around the temple.

  The temple closes for the winter on 31 October. In 2025 it photographed the color and called it at its best on the 30th, the day before. From 1 October the last bus down leaves at 15:55 instead of 17:30.

• No.35
  KamikochiNagano From about 20 October to 9 November

  Larch, which turns gold rather than red, across the whole valley floor.

  The maples come first, in the second half of October. The valley is open from 17 April to 15 November in 2026 and shut tight the rest of the year.

• No.37
  KoyasanWakayama Late October into early November

  The maple tunnel on the Jabara path, and the Konpon Daito at the Danjo Garan.

  At 800 meters it runs about five degrees Celsius colder than Osaka, so it turns two weeks before the cities do. It is also the year's worst day-trip traffic.

• No.44
  MitokusanTottori Late October into November, at its peak mid-month

  Maples and beech along the climbing path.

  The fire-walking festival falls on the last Sunday of October, at the start of the window. The mountain is shut from December to March.

• No.32
  Yufuin OnsenOita The first half of November

  Maples around Lake Kinrin.

  The fog season opened in October and runs through February. November is the month that has both, and it is the only one.

• No.8
  Iya ValleyTokushima November

  The gorge, below the vine bridge.

  The inn hearths are lit in the same weeks. The main bridge stays open all winter; the remoter double bridges close from December to March.

• No.43
  Gero OnsenGifu Mid to late November

  Onsenji's maples, floodlit, at the top of 173 stone steps.

  In 2025 the lighting ran from 12 to 24 November, dusk to 21:00, free, with a temporary footbath among the trees. The 2026 dates had not been posted when we checked.

• No.22
  KenrokuenIshikawa November

  Maples still red under the snow ropes.

  The yukitsuri ropes go up from 1 November and the crab season opens on the 6th. November is the crossover, and the only month with the color and the ropes at the same time.

• No.40
  Takeda CastleHyogo From the middle of November

  Maples on the slope below the castle, under the sea of cloud.

  The cloud sea comes on roughly one morning in three, and November is its best month. You are betting on two things at once.

• No.41
  Kurokawa OnsenKumamoto Peaking in the middle of November

  Maples on the slopes above the inns.

  The busiest weekends of the year. The other reason to come is the winter lanterns on the river, from late December.

• No.49
  MatsushimaMiyagi Around the middle of November

  Two temple gardens, both lit after dark.

  The best single month here: the color peaks, both temples light their gardens at night, and the oyster hut opens in the third week. Entsuin is ¥1,300 during the night opening instead of ¥500 by day.

• No.50
  Matsumoto CastleNagano November

  Color on the castle moat.

  The scaffolding is gone, and from the top floor of the keep the first snow is on the Jonen range behind it.

• No.71
  KankakeiKagawa From the second half of October at the top; the whole gorge at its peak between 9 and 22 November (2013 to 2025)

  Maples among pillars of volcanic rock, coloring from the top station down the gorge over about a month.

  The ropeway's own reports for thirteen autumns are on the scene page. In November the ropeway costs ¥2,700 return and the bus up from Kusakabe Port ¥500 each way.

• No.21
  Himeji CastleHyogo November

  Kokoen's maples, in the garden next to the castle.

  Cool, clear light on the keep, and none of the cherry week's queues. The maples are next door, not inside the walls.

• No.24
  MiyajimaHiroshima 15 to 30 November

  About 560 Japanese maples in one narrow valley.

  They turn all at once, and so does the crowd. It is the island's busiest fortnight, and the island after the last ferry is a different island.

• No.6
  Adachi Museum of ArtShimane November into early December

  A garden composed to be looked at through windows, in its autumn version.

  The garden is arranged for all four seasons. This is the one month it is arranged around the color, and December to February it is arranged around snow.

• No.69
  Minoh FallsOsaka Mid November to early December; at the falls, late November to early December

  Maples along a gorge path, at their best around the falls at the end of the season.

  In central Osaka, the maple the weather office watches has turned on 1 December on average. On autumn weekends the path is packed; the park recommends weekdays.

Where to go next

• Japan in autumn, the whole season laid out.
• October and November, scene by scene, with everything else that happens in those months.
• The Hundred Scenes themselves. 73 of 100 are published.

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This is what shows up when you paste the link. The dates in it are the Karasawa table above.