More glimpses of unfamiliar Japan

  Koraiji is a village on the edge of the Itoshima Plain at the base of Mount Takaso. Oimatsu Shrine was ranked as a village shrine in Meiji...

  The steps up to Wakaura Tenmangu Shrine are steep and rough, but not as long as the stairs up to the neighboring Kishu Toshogu Shrine. Wa...

  Kojiro is located on the north coast of the Shimbara Peninsula in Nagasaki, and I visited after crossing Isahaya Bay on the modern dyke. O...

  Mid February, and the plum trees lining the approach to Uchida Tenmangu are about to burst into bloom. Tenmangu shrines often have plum tr...

Osaka Tenmangu Osaka Tenmangu is a large, quiet, shrine in the middle of downtown Osaka that is the origin of Osak's biggest matsuri, th...

  A copse of tall, old trees rising from the middle of an expanse of fields is often a sure signifier of the location of a shrine. The banne...

  Tashima is a small farming hamlet  north of the river in the Chikugo River Plain. I passed through and stopped in at the local shrine whil...

Oimatsu Shrine Oimatsu Shrine is close to the Waterwheels of Hishino, and seems to be a fairly typical village shrine. I've gotten pret...