Hōryū-ji Area and Himeji-jo

Waypoint introductions and full write-ups

1. 1. 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 is where the day begins. Next is Tenryu-ji.

2. 2. Tenryu-ji

   People come to Arashiyama for the bamboo, and they leave with the memory of a garden. Tenryu-ji, the great Zen temple at the foot of the hills on the west side of Kyoto, was founded in 1339 by the shogun Ashikaga Takauji, who built it to console the spirit of the emperor Go-Daigo, his former rival. The garden, designed by the Zen master Muso Soseki, is older than almost every other thing you will see in the area: a pond with rocks arranged like a mountain landscape, with the hills of Arashiyama pulled into the view as borrowed scenery. It has survived fire after fire, though most of the halls themselves are later rebuilds.

   Read the complete Tenryu-ji write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

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

   Planning note

   Tenryu-ji comes up about 59 km into the recorded legs. Next is Himeji-jo.

3. 3. Himeji-jo

   Himeji Castle is the one that survived. Japan has a lot of reconstructed keeps, concrete inside and gift shop on the ground floor, but the big white donjon here is the real thing, largely as it stood in the early 1600s when Ikeda Terumasa rebuilt the place on the hill. It came through the bombing of 1945 and the Kobe earthquake of 1995 with the timbers intact, and it has been a World Heritage site since 1993. The plaster is so brilliantly white that people call it Hakuro-jo, the White Heron, and on a clear morning from the east side you can see why: the roofs stack up like a bird lifting off.

   Read the complete Himeji-jo write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

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

   Planning note

   about 182 km into the recorded legs you reach Himeji-jo. Next is back through Tenryu-ji.

4. 4. back through Tenryu-ji

   Return visit. Read the place description above.

   Read the complete Tenryu-ji write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

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

   Planning note

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

5. 5. Hōryū-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 at Horyu-ji Area. That is the ride.