Pilgrimage Routes - Kumano Sankeimichi - N and Horyu-ji Area

Waypoint introductions and full write-ups

1. 1. Pilgrimage Routes - Kumano Sankeimichi - N

   The Kumano Kodō is a web of ancient pilgrimage trails across the mountains of the Kii Peninsula, south of Osaka, leading to the three grand shrines of Kumano: Hongū, Hayatama and Nachi. For over a thousand years, emperors, aristocrats and ordinary pilgrims walked these paths through cedar and cypress forest, stopping at small subsidiary shrines along the way. The Nakahechi, the most popular of the routes, leaves the coast near Tanabe and climbs inland through the hills. It is part of the Sacred Sites and Pilgrimage Routes in the Kii Mountain Range, listed by UNESCO in 2004, one of only two pilgrimage routes on the list along with the Camino de Santiago, with which it is twinned.

   Read the complete Pilgrimage Routes - Kumano Sankeimichi - N write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

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

   Planning note

   Pilgrimage Routes - Kumano Sankeimichi - N is where the day begins. Next is Kôyasan - Kongôbu-ji.

2. 2. Kôyasan - Kongôbu-ji

   Getting to Kōyasan feels like a pilgrimage even on a motorcycle. The roads climb out of the Kinokawa valley through dense cedar forest, switchback after switchback, until you emerge onto a high basin at around eight hundred metres where a whole town of temples has grown up. The monk Kūkai, known after his death as Kōbō Daishi, founded the monastery here in the early ninth century as the centre of Shingon Buddhism, and Kongōbu-ji is the head temple of the sect. Its halls, painted sliding doors and the large rock garden are worth an unhurried visit, and the whole mountain is part of the UNESCO listing of the Sacred Sites and Pilgrimage Routes in the Kii Mountain Range.

   Read the complete Kôyasan - Kongôbu-ji write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

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

   Planning note

   Kôyasan - Kongôbu-ji comes up about 84 km into the recorded legs. Next is Horyu-ji Area.

3. 3. 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

   about 156 km into the recorded legs you reach Horyu-ji Area. Next is back through Kôyasan - Kongôbu-ji.

4. 4. back through Kôyasan - Kongôbu-ji

   Return visit. Read the place description above.

   Read the complete Kôyasan - Kongôbu-ji write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

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

   Planning note

   back through Kôyasan - Kongôbu-ji, late in the day. Next is Pilgrimage Routes - Kumano Sankeimichi - N.

5. 5. Pilgrimage Routes - Kumano Sankeimichi - N

   Return visit. Read the place description above.

   Read the complete Pilgrimage Routes - Kumano Sankeimichi - N write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

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

   Planning note

   Back at Pilgrimage Routes - Kumano Sankeimichi - N. That is the ride.