Aoyama Kofun and Tôdai-ji

Waypoint introductions and full write-ups

1. 1. Aoyama Kofun

   Aoyama Kofun is a modest tomb among many, one of the Furuichi mounds in southeastern Osaka that together make up a landscape of burials from the fifth century and thereabouts. The ride calls it by a nearer town, Kashihara, but the ground is the Kawachi plain, below the Kongo and Katsuragi hills, and the character is residential: low houses, small shops, canals of traffic on the main roads and quiet lanes that circle the mounds.

   Read the complete Aoyama Kofun write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Aoyama Kofun is where the day begins. Next is Horyu-ji Area.

2. 2. Hōryū-ji Area

   The buildings at Hōryū-ji are around thirteen hundred years old, and some of them are among the oldest wooden structures anywhere in the world. Founded in the early seventh century by Prince Shōtoku, a regent remembered as a champion of Buddhism and a founding figure of the Japanese state, the temple was rebuilt after a fire later in the same century, and parts of that rebuilding still stand. In 1993 it became one of the first sites in Japan to be listed by UNESCO, as the Buddhist Monuments in the Hōryū-ji Area.

   Read the complete Horyu-ji Area write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Hōryū-ji Area comes up about 18 km into the recorded legs. Next is Tôdai-ji.

3. 3. Tôdai-ji

   Nothing quite prepares you for the scale of Tōdai-ji. You walk through the great Nandaimon gate, past two fierce wooden guardian kings carved in the thirteenth century by Unkei, Kaikei and their workshop, and there it is: the Daibutsuden, the Great Buddha Hall, for centuries the largest wooden building in the world, even though the current structure, rebuilt in the early eighteenth century, is smaller than the original. Inside sits the Daibutsu, a bronze Buddha some fifteen metres tall, commissioned by Emperor Shōmu and consecrated in 752 with a ceremony that drew monks from as far away as India. The temple is part of the UNESCO listing of Historic Monuments of Ancient Nara.

   Read the complete Tôdai-ji write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   about 36 km into the recorded legs you reach Tôdai-ji. Next is back through Horyu-ji Area.

4. 4. back through Horyu-ji Area

   Return visit. Read the place description above.

   Read the complete Horyu-ji Area write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   back through Horyu-ji Area, late in the day. Next is Aoyama Kofun.

5. 5. Aoyama Kofun

   Return visit. Read the place description above.

   Read the complete Aoyama Kofun write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Back at Aoyama Kofun. That is the ride.