Winter solstice at Iwaya-Iwakage

Shiho tokuda points to the light from the rising sun striking the G-stone in Iwaya-Iwakage of December 25, 2023 at 10:18am. All photos by Ms. Chika.

We have relayed Kazuo Sugisaka’s report on the Winter Solstice observation of December 2023. Many other winter observations are possible at Iwaya-Iwakage on the hill at the Kanayama Megaliths. See pp 42-43 in the Kanayama Megaliths Guidebook. We have not previously reported on this phenomenon where the light of the rising sun strikes the bottom of the G-stone.

The morning sun crests the ridge on the east, as seen from inside the Iwaya-Iwakage. The eave of the small Shinto shrine is seen in the lower right half of the photo taken at 10:21 am.

We are grateful to our friends who share their photos and experiences at the Kanayama Megaliths. Happy New Year 2024 to All!

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Winter solstice sun 2023

The photo was taken at 16:04 on December 24th at the B-stone.

Winter Solstice 2023

Winter solstice arrived on Friday, December 22, 2023 at 03:27 UTC.

We have a report from Kazuo Sugisaka in Kanayama who sent us the striking photo above:

“On the day of the winter solstice, it sometimes snowed, and although it was sunny the next day, I couldn’t get a good photo of it, which is why the photo was taken on the 24th.”

Winter solstice, pronounced tōji in Japanese and written as 冬至, is archaically read as fuyu-itaru which means the arrival of winter.

Okunomichi posted this explanation of the winter solstice of 2020:

HAPPY NEW YEAR! WINTER SOLSTICE 2020

Thank you, Kazuo Sugisaka, for sharing your photo and your experience with us.

Best wishes for the new year to everyone in the world. Let peace prevail on Earth!

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