The Garden at Myokanji

I came to an appreciation of the Japanese garden quite late. The first two years I lived in Japan I was in Kyoto which reputedly has a large number of highly ranked gardens, but I didnt visit any of them.

Like many people, I think my favorite style is karesansui, the dry gardens of rock and sand.

This one is at Myokani, a small temple in Iizuka, Fukuoka Prefecture, and doesnt appear in any lists of gardens to see, but I found it quite appealing.

Karesansui is strongly associated with Zen, though I believe they were imported from China a little before Zen and the use of white gravel has been attributed to a Shinto influence. Myokanji is not a Zen temple, rather a Shingon one, but it may have been Zen in earlier times though I have been unable to find a date for the garden.