Things Seen Between Kannabiji and Chokoji

 

Late April, 2014, and I am on day 6 of my walk along the Iwami Kannon Pilgrimage. Visiting two temples today and I started from my home and headed upriver. First pilgrimage temple was Kannabiji, and the next is Chokoji. These photos are from things I noticed between the two temples.

Not far from Kannabiji is/was Mizunokuni, the top photo. A  museum specializing in water, I have visited often and most vistors I took rated it very highly. It closed down in 2018. Some shots from a last visit....

The second photo is a kura, storehouse, that has been beautifully restored. This third shot is one of the many roadside statues found everywhere. This one looks to have not been tended in quite a while.

From the water museum I head away from the Gonokawa River and up a side valley. I am pretty certain that on most days there is absolutely no traffic as it is a forest road that doesnt have any habitation along it.

A little further and you catch a glimpse of Sakamoto Falls. Climbing over the roadside crash barriet and edge along a rock outcropping and it becomes more clearly visible.

I can find no details about, height etc. I seem to remember that twenty years ago is was marked on maps as "Big waterfall".

A little further up the valley and I reach the side road that climbs out of it and over to Mihara. Right there at the junction is the skeleton of a wild boar.

A pretty big one, and it has been picked clean. Hard to believe it would have been a road kill as any traffic would be moving pretty slowly.

The road climbs through the forest and emerges in the farming settlement of Mihara. Nearby is Maruyama, a conical mountain on top of which once stood Maruyama Castle. The lord of that castle was a big supporter of both Kannabiji and Chokoji temples.

The rice paddies are all being flooded in preparation for planting in a week or two.

I head east across Mihara and then start to descend another empty, rural road towards Yudani where I will find Chokoji. No matter where you go in Japan you are never far from an expanse of concrete, whether it is on a mountainside or a coastline.

This badger was out and about in the middle of the day. Usually active at dusk and in the night, I have seen them occasionally during the day. here are a couple of post with short videos of badgers around my house. The previous post was on Kannabiji Temple.

Kannabiji Temple 11 on the Iwami Kannon pilgrimage

 

Kannabiji is one of the oldest temples in the area I live. It was founded in 746 and it is said that Kobo Daishi later visited and converted it to Shingon.

It was located halfway up a mountain and was supported by the Ogasawara Clan who operated from the nearby Maruyama Castle. In 1872 the area suffered a big earthquake known as the Hamada Earthquake and it caused the spring at the temple to dry up, so the temple was forced to relocate to its current location.

When I visited in early May the azaleas and botanzakura were in full bloom. In the grounds is a very large weeping cherry and by the gate a huge gingko. These last two may have been in the old temple that stood here before Kannabiji was moved here.

I was visiting on day 6 of my walk along the Iwami Kannon pilgrimage, with Kannabiji being number 11. It is also temple 22 on the recently rediscovered Iwami Ginzan Kannon pilgrimage.

The honzon is a Kokuzo Boddhisattva, not a very well-known bodhisattva, but the one that was instrumental in the training of Kobo Daishi..

The Nio are quite cool, and by the side of the main building are a set of rakan statues, (last photo). I cant remember seeing the Kannon statue.

The priest lives nearby in a modern house, but a huge, traditional house sits to the left of the main hall.

The main altar bis quite colourful, with some excellent dragon paintings.

The storehouse is actually a small museum whose prize possession is the remains of a set of samurai armour that dates back to the Heian period and is believed to be the second or third oldest samurai armour in Japan. It is not much to look at but at the art museum in Sakurae Town is a full replica.

On this leg of my walk I walked the route "backwards" from my house upriver. The previous post was on the Zen temple in my village, Hikasaji.

Hikasaji Temple 32 Iwami Ginzan Kannon pilgrimage

 

Hikasaji is a small, Soto Zen temple about one kilometer upstream from my village. I was walking day 6 of my walk along the Iwami Mandal Kannon pilgrimage. heading upriver to the next couple of temples on that pilgrimage.

Hikasaji is not on that pilgrimage, but is temple 32 on the Iwami Ginzan Kannon pilgrimage, a recently rediscovered pilgrimage route from the Edo period.

In the early Edo period the Tokugawa government took over the silver mine at Iwami Ginzan and made it their territory. It encompassed all the land from this side of the Gonokawa River up to the border with Izumo. The Iwami Kannon pilgrimage I have been walking covers all of the Iwami area including the other side of the river. I am guessing the new Iwami Ginzan Kannon pilgrimage dates back to then.

I can find no information on when Hikasaji was founded. The Kannon statue that was the honzon no longer exists, but there is a newish Kannon statue on the grounds.

The temple gate is quite nice, and there is also a small bell tower.

The documents about the old Ginzan pilgrimage were recently discovered in an old storehouse belonging to a former samurai family a few more kilometers upstream near to the next temple I will stop at.

The previous post in this series on day 6 of my walk was on the koinobori hanging across the river in front of the temple.

Sakurae Koinobori

 

Early May, 2013, and I start day 6 of my walk along the Kannon pilgrimage in the former province of Iwami, the Iwami Mandala Kannon. The last temple I visited was Senganji upriver in Kawamoto and the next two temples lie between it and my home so I decided to start out from my house and walk this section in reverse as it were.

The azaleas were starting to bloom and a few houses had koinobori carp streamers flying.

The colourful bridge that crosses the river between Tanijyugo, my village, and Kawado on the opposite bank, had recently had a new coat of paint.

Just upstream from the Kawado Bridge, two lines of koinobori are stretched across the river.

On the far bank is where the local suijin festival will take place on May 5th. A large Onusa, a purification wand, hangs over the river at this point to pacify the turbulent water deity.

The previous post in this series was Senganji Temple. Also please check out this post about the water deity Suijin.

Senganji Temple 9 on the Iwami Kannon pilgrimage

 

Senganji Temple, number 9 on the Iwami Kannon pilgrimage, sits on a steep hillside overlooking the small town of Kawamoto on the Gonokawa River.

It is a Soto Zen temple with a Jizo for a honzon, and was founded in 1576.

It was originally located in a valley to the west but was burned down, quite ossibly due to warfare.

On to of the mountain was a castle belonging to the Ogasawara Clan who ruled the area, with the agreement of the powerful Mori Clan.

Senganji and two powerful temples nearby, also both on the Iwami Kannon pilgrimage, all had strong connections with the Ogasawara and were considered clan temples.

Senganji has been uninhabited and rarely visited for some time, and since I visited ten years ago I have seen photos showing a lot of deterioration and collapse in the buildings.

According to one source there were several residences at the temple until about 100 years ago.

The previous post was on the path up the mountainside to the temple which has many statues.

Senganji is also temple number 21 on the Iwami Ginzan Kannon pilgrimage, a recently rediscovered pilgrimage route.

The Climb to Senganji Temple

 

Kawamoto is the next town up the Gonokawa River from my village.

Halfway up the steep hillside across the river from downtown Kawamoto is a small temple, Senganji.

The temple becomes really visible in late Autumn when the trees around it turn orange, yellow, and red.

I have actually only made it up to the temple one time, after walking down from Iwami Ginzan on day 5 of my walk along the Iwami Kannon pilgrimage.

Senganji is temple number 9 on that pilgrimage.

There is no vehicular access to Senganji, only a footpath with more than 200 steps, which is, I think, a large reason the temple has been uninhabited for a long time.

There are numerous statues along the path, inlcuding a lot of Jizo but also some Kannon.

When I visited in the late afternoon in May, the shafts of sunlight illumnated many of the statues quite dramatically.

Tomorrow I will post photos from inside the temple and include what history I have been able to find out.

According to a recent photo I saw, the structure housing this collection of statues has  now completely collapsed.

The temple occuppies a narrow ledge in the steep hillside.

The previous post in this series on the Iwami kannon pilgrimage was Ido Shrine in Omori.