Up the Yoshino River to Ikeda

 

A wayside Fudo Myo statue is a timely reminder that I am walking the Shikoku Fudo Myo pilgrimage as I leave the Teramachi district of Mima in Tokushima and continue west along the Yoshino River.

For these first three days of the pilgrimage, I have been following the river upstream as it heads almost perfectly East to West. I had spent the morning visiting interesting sites in Mima after first visiting temple 3 of the pilgrimage. The next cluster of three temples was around Ikeda 20-30 kilometers upstream, and also where I had a room booked for the night, so I simply walked West along the north bank as quickly as I could, forgoing any distractions.

After the three temples in the Ikeda area, I would be heading back down the river on the southern bank where another couple of temples lay.

The river continued to be wide as did its valley, and there were relatively few bridges.

The valley narrowed as I approached Ikeda, and the river made a turn here and eventually headed into the middle of Shikoku through the spectacular Oboke Gorge and the now-famous Iya Valley. Across from Ikeda the very steep mountainside is terraced with rice paddies and scenic villages.

Once I reached Hashikura I jumped on a train that crossed the river and took me to Ikeda. Hashikura is the site of the next temple but I wanted to return the next day for the next leg.

My room for the next 2 nights was perched high above the river looking down on the Shikinoue pedestrian suspension bridge.

The previous post in this series was on Ganshoji Temple in Mima Teramachi

Kumano Shrine Yoshii

 

The Kumano Shrine in Yoshii, Nagasaki, is a fairly typical small, rural shrine. Set on a small, flat area within a forest clearing, it is reached by several long flights of stairs.

Architecturally it is really just a utilitarian shed housing a small hokora-type shrine with a small altar set up in front of it. However, it looked as if the building had been wider at some point.

There may have been some stone komainu, and the remains of some stone lanterns could be seen, however on the altar was a pair of small, wooden komainu.

Being a Kumano Shrine it enshrines the Kumano Gongen, the collective name for the kami enshrined at the three Kumano shrines in southern Wakayama. There are about 3,000 branch shrines of Kumano in Japan, with three being within just a few kilometers of this one.

I visited in late March 2014 on day 68 of my walk around Kyushu following the Shingon Kyushu 108 temple pilgrimage dedicated to Kobo Daishi. This was the final leg that would see me finishing the pilgrimage ten days later. First I must visit Hirado Island, then go back into Saga prefecture before heading to Munakata in Fukuoka. The previous post in this series was on the shrines I visited on day 67.

Seikantei Garden Kinosaki

 

Gokurakuji Temple is hidden away in a corner of Kinosaki Onsen and is barely visited by the majority of visitors to the resort town, who will miss a quite remarkable garden.

Called Seikan Tei, it is a karesansui, "dry garden" most often associated with Zen, and Gokurakuji is a Rinzai Zen temple.

It is somewhat unusual in that the garden is in front of the main hall and the entrance pathway cuts right through it. many of the traditional gardens were built to be viewed from the rear of the main hall or from the Abbot's residence.

The most unusual thing, to my mind, was that one half of the garden used areas of white gravel and dark gravel, something I don't remember noticing before.

The light and dark areas are separated by a border made of roof tiles set vertically, something that is quite common.

Actually the light areas inside the dark ground form the Chinese character for kokoro, "heart". This is sometimes the shape of ponds.

The rock and moss "islands" in the sea of gravel  also use standard design representations, there being a Crame Island, a Turtle Island, a Three Buddhas Island.....

The garden uses a red rock brought from Kurama, a blue rock from Yoshino, and Shirakawa sand from Kyoto.

 I have been unable to establish when the garden was built. Most sources suggest it is fairly modern and a photo of it dates to 1976.

One source suggests it was designed by a disciple of Mirei Shigemori.

Entry is free, so if you are in the area it would be well worth a visit.

Later I will post on the temple and its history and the nice rock garden in front of it.

The previous post in this series on Toyooka was on the lower part of nearby Onsenji Temple.

Shrines of Day 67

 

For many pilgrims, I believe the main priority is to get from temple to temple. The temples are the focus. For me, however, the temples were just reference points on an exploratory walk. The sites between the temples were just as important, and I tried to stop in at every single shrine I passed, both to learn any interesting local history and myths, and to find unique and interesting art.

On Day 67 of my walk around the Shingon Kyushu pilgrimage, I started the day in Sasebo, Nagasaki, visiting a pilgrimage temple then headed north out of town to the Ainoura River valley. These first four photos are from Nakazato Hachiman Shrine, a fairly standard village shrine to Hachiman, by one count the most common shrine in Japan.

With its Hizen-style torii, and modern komainu, there were no surprises here. Like most village shrines numerous smaller shrines had been brought here from neighboring areas in the early part of the 20th century.

I visited nearby temple number 74, Tozenji before heading on up the valley. In Tabarucho I stopped in at Norito Shrine. A little further I saw the unusual shimenawa of Yodohime Shrine.

The next four photos are from my next stop, an unnamed Inari Shrine.

If you include small, roadside shrines without buildings, then Inari, rather than Hachiman, becomes the most common shrine in Japan.

The vast majority of Inari shrines only date back to the Edo period when Inari became so popular.

Continuing to climb my next stop was Kamiari Shrine.

There is absolutely no info on this shrine which was obviously more substantial in earlier times, but now is just a small, stone honden.

It enshrines Amaterasu.

Not far from Kamiari Shrine I spent quite a bit of time exploring Saikoji Temple, number 73 on the pilgrimage with a notable Giant Fudo statue. I had now climbed to more than 300 meters above sea level and while heading to a mountain tunnel that would take me over to the next valley I could see an Oyamazumi Shrine in tye distance set in a tell-tale grove of trees.

Dropping down into and then slowly descending the Sasa River Valley my first stop was another Oyamazumi Shrine, this one with a unique old-growth ecosystem. This was once a coal mining area and after a brief stop at the local coal mine museum I visited the last pilgrimage temple of the day, Saifukuji Temle with its cave shrine.

I carried on down the valley and just before reaching Yoshii Station and the train back into Sasebo I stopped in at a very small shrine. I have no idea of the shrines name as I couldnt read the eroded kanji on the torii, and can not find it on the map, but it did have a nice pair of komainu.

If you enjoyed this post you might also enjoy the post on shrines of day 66.

Nima Harbour

 

Nima, a small town on the coast of Shimane is probably most famous nowadays for its unusual Sand Museum dedicated to the singing sands of nearby Kotogahama Beach.

The most sheltered part of the harbour is the main branch of the Shio River which has been blocked off forcing the river to empty into the sea down a fork. This has left a deep channel sheltered behind what was an island. The river was blocked off by rocks, not a concrete wall, which suggests it was done earlier.

The new harbour is a typical concrete affair with a big breakwater just outside its entrance.

There were not a lot of boats, and just one larger squid boat, but the harbour does have an ice machine. Japan Fisheries is the marine equivalent of Japan Agriculture, both technically co-operatives but in essence, massive organizations controlling huge budgets most of which seems to end up with the biggest Japanese corporations, especially concrete companies.

Just outside the new harbour is a rock outcropping called Kaiju Rock. I believe kaiju is a relatively new word that refers to giant monsters, the most famous being of course Godzilla.

Just past the harbour is a small, delightful beach..... The previous post was on the walk from Maji

Yodohime Shrine Shimenawa & Yamodo Festival

 

When I saw the shimenawa on the torii to Yodohime Shrine I knew it was unusual, but only when I did the research for this post did I realize its significance. The very small, local shrine lies at the border of Matsubara and Yamine, in the mountains north of Sasebo, Nagasaki. The shrine was established in the first years of the 11th century and enshrines Toyotamahime, the grandmother of the mythical first emperor Jimmu who features in the Hyuga Myth Cycle.

The Yamodo Matsuri takes place every new year, now set as the end of January, and culminates in the shimenawa being replaced with a new one, made by the parishioners out of rice straw from the previous harvest. Yamodo is derived from yama udo which means mountain man and refers to a kind of marebito, an idea of an outsider as a god from another world. In this case it refers to the Yamanokami that descends from the mountains in the Spring to become the Tanokami, god of the rice paddies, during the summer and then returns to the mountains after the harvest.

In the Yamodo festival 2 young men, one from each village, whose parents are still living and healthy, undergo various purifications and then act as the yama udo in various ways during the festival. The festival is now registered as an Intangible Cultural property of the prefecture.

There is a 23-minute video on the matsuri, in Japanese, on YouTube, if you are interested. The previous post was on Saifukuji Temple and its cave.