This Japanese Town Fed Kyoto for 1,000 Years on Mackerel

A small fishing town on Japan's coast kept an entire capital city fed for over a millennium, and you can still walk the path they used.

Obama sits on the Sea of Japan in Fukui Prefecture, connected to Kyoto by the legendary Saba Kaido, or "Mackerel Road." Starting in the eighth century, merchants packed fresh mackerel in salt and trekked through mountain passes to reach the landlocked imperial capital. The timing was perfect: the overnight journey seasoned the fish to perfection.

The town itself was founded alongside Kyoto around 1,200 years ago, though people had been harvesting salt there for even longer. Obama became a crucial gateway where ideas, technologies, and culture from mainland Asia flowed into Japan's ancient capitals of Nara and Kyoto.

Today, visitors can trace the final stretch of the old Mackerel Road as it overlaps with the preserved Tango Kaido highway. The path winds through Obama's former merchant quarter, where Edo Period buildings still stand with their original wooden facades. In the old red-light district of Sanchome, little cloth monkeys hang from the eaves, traditional charms meant to absorb any illness or bad luck headed for residents.

The Wakasahiko and Wakasahime Shrines guard the harbor with trees over 1,000 years old. Their massive trunks and sprawling branches shade a noh stage built with saplings brought from Kyoto's Imperial Palace, now grown tall. The shrines still watch over local fishermen, just as they have since the eighth century.

Two Buddhist temples sit in the mountains beyond the coast, both established shortly after Buddhism reached Japan. Wakasa Jingu Temple hosts a sacred water ritual each March that predates the more famous ceremony at Nara's Todaiji temple by 10 days. Nearby Myotsu Temple, 100 years older, requires a steep climb that rewards visitors with an 800-year-old pagoda dwarfed by even older trees.

The Ripple Effect: Obama's connection to Kyoto shows how small communities have always sustained great cities. The merchants who made that grueling mountain trek didn't just deliver food. They carried culture, news, and innovation between the coast and the capital, creating networks that shaped Japanese civilization. Their route reminds us that progress often travels on the backs of everyday people doing essential work.

Walking these preserved streets and pathways connects modern visitors to centuries of human effort, one mackerel delivery at a time.