This is the planned tour… We’re arriving in Ōsaka Kansai, travelling via Kyōto up to Kanazawa first of all, then in the other direction via Okayama (with a detour to Takamatsu) onwards to Fukuoka. Via Hiroshima, we’re heading back to Kyōto. The former capital will be our base for further trips, for example to Nara and possibly Yokohama. Finally, we’ll be heading back to Germany via Ōsaka Kansai.
Travel Journal 2017
Finally we’re in Japan! Kyoto is a great place to get over jet lag. For instance, at Higashi Hongan-ji, where you immediately get that proper temple vibe.
Now that we’re rested from the flight, we can head on to Kanazawa.
A few impressions from Kanazawa, the capital of Ishikawa Prefecture.
We visited an old teahouse district and a samurai district, checked out the castle and the park next to it, and of course a bunch of temples and shrines.
Today we were in the neighbouring town of Takaoka, where hardly any tourists ever wander off to. There was a lovely temple complex called Zuiryū-ji to see, as well as a Buddha sitting out in the open.
Besides that, we went to the little village of Kagaonsen, which caught our eye on the drive to Kanagawa because of a huge golden statue on a hill. We couldn’t find anything about it in travel guides, so we just drove over and found a temple complex in a deep slumber. Some of the buildings were in a pretty sad state, but we got a personal tour and saw a hall with 1,188 golden Buddha statues, a 10-metre tall gilded bell and a 17-metre tall 5-storey pagoda, in gold of course. The statue on the outside is an impressive 73 metres tall. Back in the day, it really must have been quite the attraction. For us, it’s one of those surprises that makes us love coming back to Japan time and time again.
We’re on our way to Okayama.
