On Sunday I used the Habikino City Hall parking lot and explored the Furuichi Kofun Group by bicycle. I also went out to Otorizuka Kofun, northeast of Kondagobyoyama Kofun (Mausoleum of Emperor Ojin). This is a valuable World Heritage site where you can not only look from outside, but also go in and climb the mound. Since it's a more manageable size than the huge kofun around it, you can clearly see the keyhole shape. Moreover, it has an unbalanced construction with a remarkably tall rear circular part, and it's fun to actually climb it on foot and feel how steep the slope is. On the mound there are also large depressions thought to be remains of wartime "entaigo" (revetments: facilities for hiding aircraft and the like), giving a sense of the layers of history from ancient to modern times. There's no parking for tourists, but it's easy to approach by bicycle, and it was a wonderful hidden gem where you can experience the charm of kofun with all five senses.

A kofun that is moderately forested. There are lots of fist-sized stones on top of the rear circular part, and I think they might be fukiishi (paving stones), but I wonder. Also, it may not come across in photos, but there's a mysterious depression at the top of the rear circular part. It could be taken as a trace of tomb robbing, but according to the information board the burial facility is a clay enclosure, so it doesn't seem to be from robbing.

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It's surrounded by a fence made of imitation wood, but there's a gap in the fence on the side of the worship spot for Emperor Ojin's mausoleum, so it seems you can enter from there. Compared to the neighboring Komuroyama Kofun, the slope of the mound feels steeper. This too is a valuable kofun in the Furuichi Kofun Group where you can go onto the mound.

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A keyhole-shaped tomb with a mound length of 110 meters, believed to have been built in the early 5th century, with a surrounding moat (dry moat) that is now preserved buried underground. The west side of the rear circular part seems to have been leveled. The slopes of the mound were covered with stones, and cylindrical haniwa seem to have been lined up on the flat parts. You can enter the mound of this kofun, so I walked around, and there were not-so-large stones lying all over the place. There's a trace of a collapse at the top of the rear circular part, and it seems to have been robbed. I visited after exploring Komuroyama Kofun, and for some reason it felt a bit underwhelming (the height?).

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I think one of the attractions of the Furuichi Kofun Group is that, unlike the Mozu Kofun Group, there are many kofun you can climb. This is one of the climbable ones: mound length 110m, rear circular part diameter 73m, front part width 50m (unusually narrow), with projections (tsukuridashi) on both sides of the constricted part. It was surrounded by a horseshoe-shaped moat. The rear circular part has 3 tiers and the front part has 2. Its construction makes you wonder if it's scallop-shaped, but it's a keyhole-shaped tomb. On the slope of the rear circular part there's a section where a square hole has been dug, and when I looked it up, I found it was a hole dug during World War II to hide military aircraft. That side is dangerous, so even if you climb, it's probably best not to go near it. I was surprised to find something that's almost 100% a haniwa fragment just lying right there at the top of the rear circular part. It's easy to slip on the way down, so be careful.