Ujigami-jinja and Hanzei-tenno-ryo Kofun

Waypoint introductions and full write-ups

1. 1. Ujigami-jinja

   Uji is a small city on the river of the same name, south of Kyoto, and it holds two treasures that face each other across the water. On the west bank stands the Byōdō-in, a temple whose Phoenix Hall, built in 1053, appears on the Japanese ten-yen coin. On the east bank, up a quiet lane, is Ujigami-jinja, a modest shrine whose main hall is considered the oldest surviving Shinto shrine building in Japan, dating from the late Heian period, in the eleventh century. Its simple wooden structure, with a cypress-bark roof, stands in a small courtyard surrounded by trees, and it is far less crowded than the Byōdō-in. Both are part of the UNESCO listing of the Historic Monuments of Ancient Kyoto.

   Read the complete Ujigami-jinja write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

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

   Planning note

   Ujigami-jinja 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 41 km into the recorded legs. Next is Tatsusayama Kofun.

3. 3. Tatsusayama Kofun

   Southern Osaka has a secret that is hard to see from the ground: its suburbs are woven around ancient burial mounds, some of them among the largest tombs ever built. In Sakai, these kofun belong to the Mozu group, which, together with the Furuichi group further east, was inscribed as a World Heritage site in 2019. Tatsusayama is one of the smaller mounds, a wooded hill surrounded by houses and roads, but it is part of the same story. Between roughly the fourth and sixth centuries, the rulers of the Yamato court and their elite were buried in tombs shaped like keyholes when seen from above, with moats around them and clay figures called haniwa placed on their slopes.

   Read the complete Tatsusayama Kofun write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

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

   Planning note

   about 72 km into the recorded legs you reach Tatsusayama Kofun. Next is Yakushi-ji.

4. 4. Yakushi-ji

   Yakushi-ji is one of the great temples of Nara, the capital of Japan in the eighth century. It was founded by Emperor Tenmu in the late seventh century, praying for the recovery of his ill empress, and moved to its present site when the capital moved to Nara in 710. Dedicated to Yakushi Nyorai, the Buddha of healing, it is part of the UNESCO-listed Historic Monuments of Ancient Nara. The East Pagoda, which has stood since the eighth century, is one of the few surviving buildings from that era, and its layered roofs, with smaller roofs between each storey, create a rhythm described by one admirer as frozen music.

   Read the complete Yakushi-ji write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

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

   Planning note

   Yakushi-ji, about halfway. Next is Hanzei-tenno-ryo Kofun.

5. 5. Hanzei-tenno-ryo Kofun

   The Mozu kofun are strange. In the middle of modern Sakai, a heavy industrial and residential city south of Osaka, rise huge forested mounds surrounded by water-filled moats, some of them shaped like a keyhole, and these are the tombs of the rulers of Japan from the fifth century. Hanzei's tomb is one of the smaller ones in the group, though still well over a hundred metres long, and it is easily reached because the moat path runs around it. The giant of the group, attributed to Emperor Nintoku, is nearly five hundred metres long and one of the largest tombs in the world by area.

   Read the complete Hanzei-tenno-ryo Kofun write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

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

   Planning note

   Hanzei-tenno-ryo Kofun sits at 155 km, about halfway. Next is back through Yakushi-ji.

6. 6. back through Yakushi-ji

   Return visit. Read the place description above.

   Read the complete Yakushi-ji write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

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

   Planning note

   back through Yakushi-ji comes up about 186 km into the recorded legs. Next is back through Tatsusayama Kofun.

7. 7. back through Tatsusayama Kofun

   Return visit. Read the place description above.

   Read the complete Tatsusayama Kofun write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

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

   Planning note

   about 225 km into the recorded legs you reach back through Tatsusayama Kofun. Next is back through Hokki-ji Area.

8. 8. 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 Ujigami-jinja.

9. 9. Ujigami-jinja

   Return visit. Read the place description above.

   Read the complete Ujigami-jinja write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

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

   Planning note

   The route ends here after 296 km.