Rokusho Shrine is a Shinto sanctuary that traces its history back to Matsudaira Chikauji (d. 1394?), the founder of the Matsudaira samurai family that ruled the lands around the village of Matsudaira from the late 1300s onward. According to legend, Chikauji established the shrine on the summit of Mt. Rokusho so that the enshrined deities would watch over his family who lived in the valley below. However, the mountain itself is though...

Myoshoji is a small Soto Zen temple with deep ties to the Matsudaira samurai family that ruled the lands around the village of Matsudaira from the late 1300s onward. The temple is located in Otaki Gorge on a terraced plot supported by moss-covered stone walls. It is a few minutes’ walk uphill along the river from the parking lot at the entrance to the gorge. The structures include the main hall built in 1854, a somewhat older gate th...

Zofukuji Temple—otherwise known as “Furindera Temple”, meaning the “Wind Chime Temple”—is a Buddhist temple in the small, 300-person town of Odo. In 2002, the temple became the first in Japan to receive wind chimes as donations after Zofukuji Temple’s chief priest answered the wishes of the younger generation to revitalize the Odo area. Over 7,000 of these wind chimes, known as Odo’s “Yumekake Furin Wind Chimes”, are enshrined withi...

Daihiden Toshoji is a Soto Zen temple located approximately 300 meters northeast of the main grounds of Sanage Shrine at the base of Mt. Sanage. It was founded in 1932 by a priest with a strong faith in Kannon, the bodhisattva of compassion. He was inspired to establish a new temple next to Yamanaka Kannondo, a historic hall that houses a famous tenth-century statue of Senju Kannon, the thousand-armed incarnation of the bodhisattva. ...

Daianji Temple belongs to the Soto school of Zen Buddhism and was established in the year 1624. The temple has the honorific mountain name of Choshozan and is a branch temple of Ryukoin Temple. Within the temple grounds, the weeping cherry tree is especially enchanting. Around 180 years old, the weeping cherry tree is also lit up at night from early to mid-April.