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Wakayama Live Cameras in Japan — 3 official webcams

An underwater camera at Kushimoto Marine Park, and river cameras on the Kino and Kumano. Kushimoto shows fish regardless of season — the only underwater view on this site.

What you can see

One camera from the Ministry of the Environment and two from the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism. Kushimoto Marine Park is one of the very few underwater cameras on this site. Unlike the cameras on land, what governs the view is not the weather but the clarity of the water, and the gap between a good day and a murky one is wide. It films coral and fish living in the warm water the Kuroshio brings, directly from below the surface.

Of the two rivers, the Kumano is the one the World Heritage Kumano pilgrimage routes cross. Pilgrims once came down it by boat, and long stretches run through gorge. Along the Ki river the valley is orchard country, and the river terraces step down through the frame.

Coral appears on the Kushimoto camera because this is the southern end of Honshu. Cape Shionomisaki at Kushimoto is the southernmost point of the main island, and the Kuroshio runs past just offshore. With that warm water passing closer here than anywhere else, coral species that properly belong to seas much further south can form colonies on a Honshu shore. By latitude alone this is too far north for what lives here. For the same reason the cast of fish differs from the rest of Honshu's coasts.

3 cameras in Wakayama

2 video, 1 still. Tap one to open it in the camera list.

When to watch

The Kushimoto Marine Park camera sits below the surface. Unlike the land cameras it barely cares about weather, and it has no season. Rough seas do cloud the water to the point of showing nothing, so avoid it just after a typhoon. The Kuroshio current runs close to Kushimoto, putting it near the northern limit for coral and giving the water a colour you would not expect off Honshu.

The Kumano River is part of the World Heritage site 'Sacred Sites and Pilgrimage Routes in the Kii Mountain Range', inscribed as a pilgrimage route travelled by river.

Closer looks at cameras here

Agencies publishing the cameras on this page

The footage belongs to each agency. This site is an unofficial guide, and each sample frame was copied once per camera under that agency's terms of use.

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