Between Ōi and Ōkute, the road was very narrow and mountainous and goes through 13 passes (Jusan-toge), with irregular stone steps in places.

The station is located at the foot of the Biwa Pass (琵琶峠, Biwa-tōge), which has a monument with a poem by Princess Kazu-no-miya, who stayed overnight at Ōkute-juku en-route to her marriage to Shogun Tokugawa Iemochi in Edo.

Per the 1843 "中山道宿村大概帳" (Nakasendō Shukuson Taigaichō) guidebook issued by the Inspector of Highways (道中奉行, Dōchu-būgyō), the town had a population of 338 people in 66 houses, including one honjin, one waki-honjin, and 30 hatago.

The print is a bizarre composition showing surrealistically shaped boulders which make the work an almost abstract landscape.

Two woodcutters with tall stacks of firewood on their backs are depicted climbing a steep slope and gazing at a hillside with blocks of exposed rock and weirdly-shaped pine trees and featureless hills.