Ryoan-ji and Kôyasan - Niutsuhime-jinja

Waypoint introductions and full write-ups

1. 1. Ryoan-ji

   Fifteen stones, a rectangle of raked white gravel, and an earthen wall stained by centuries of oil: that is all of Ryoan-ji's famous garden, and it has kept visitors quiet for five hundred years. The stones sit in five groups, set in beds of moss, and the clever thing, which every guidebook mentions and which is still a pleasure to test, is that from any seat on the temple veranda at least one stone is hidden from view. Nobody knows who made it or what it means. People have read tigers crossing the sea, islands in an ocean, mountains above clouds, or simply an exercise in emptiness. The temple belongs to the Rinzai school of Zen and was founded in the middle of the fifteenth century by a powerful warlord, Hosokawa Katsumoto.

   Read the complete Ryoan-ji write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

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

   Planning note

   Ryoan-ji is where the day begins. Next is Hokki-ji Area.

2. 2. Hokki-ji Area

   Ikaruga, a quiet town on the western edge of the Nara basin, is where Japanese Buddhist architecture begins. The temple of Hōryū-ji, founded by Prince Shōtoku in the early seventh century, has wooden buildings counted among the oldest surviving in the world, and in 1993 the Buddhist Monuments in the Hōryū-ji Area became, along with Himeji Castle, the first Japanese sites on the UNESCO list. A short distance north, among rice fields and houses, Hokki-ji is a smaller temple with a single treasure: a three-storey pagoda completed in the early eighth century, the oldest of its type in Japan. Seen across the fields with the hills behind, it is a lovely, peaceful sight.

   Read the complete Hokki-ji Area write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

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

   Planning note

   Hokki-ji Area comes up about 55 km into the recorded legs. Next is Kôyasan - Niutsuhime-jinja.

3. 3. Kôyasan - Niutsuhime-jinja

   A hunter with two dogs, according to the legend, is why Koyasan exists. When the monk Kukai, later called Kobo Daishi, returned from studying in China in the early ninth century, he threw a ritual three-pronged object into the air and asked it to land on a site for a mountain monastery. He found it hanging in a pine tree on a high plateau in the Kii mountains, and there he met a hunter, the god Karibamyojin, who led him to the place with his dogs. The hunter's mother, the goddess Niutsuhime, is honoured at the shrine that guards the approach. Kukai founded his monastery in 816, and Koyasan has been the headquarters of Shingon Buddhism since.

   Read the complete Kôyasan - Niutsuhime-jinja write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

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

   Planning note

   about 118 km into the recorded legs you reach Kôyasan - Niutsuhime-jinja. Next is back through Hokki-ji Area.

4. 4. back through Hokki-ji Area

   Return visit. Read the place description above.

   Read the complete Hokki-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 Hokki-ji Area, late in the day. Next is Ryoan-ji.

5. 5. Ryoan-ji

   Return visit. Read the place description above.

   Read the complete Ryoan-ji write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

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

   Planning note

   Back at Ryoan-ji. That is the ride.