Kyoto– category –

Nisonin Temple sits at the foot of Mount Ogura, and most visitors walk right past it. They come to Arashiyama for the Bamboo Grove, for Togetsukyo Bridge, for the crush of selfie sticks and rickshaws. But keep walking north through the q...

Most visitors to Arashiyama never make it this far north. They turn left at the bamboo grove, loop past Tenryuji, cross the Togetsukyo Bridge, and call it a day. Their loss. Daikakuji sits twenty minutes on foot from the crowds — far eno...

Gioji Temple is a small nunnery tucked into the far reaches of Sagano, in the northwest of Arashiyama. It is best known for two things: its connection to the Tale of the Heike, and a garden carpeted almost entirely in moss. Few places in...

I first came to Jojakkoji in the autumn of 2025, on a photographers-only early-entry program — a limited number of visitors allowed onto the grounds before 9 a.m. The photographer next to me told me he'd been waiting years for something ...

The bus stopped. The doors opened. I just couldn't get on. People were packed all the way to the standing room. So I gave up. I'd walk. I had already prayed my way from Kitano Tenmangu to Hirano Shrine, and Kinkakuji was barely a kilomet...

Most travelers in Kyoto have never heard of Konkai-komyoji. Locals know it by its older nickname, Kurodani-san — "Mr. Black Valley" — and for a head temple of the Pure Land sect with a gate as commanding as any in the city...

I had never heard of Shinnyodo Temple until I was standing almost on top of it. I spotted its name on a wooden signboard inside the grounds of the neighboring Konkai-Komyoji, walked over almost as an afterthought, and ended up spending o...

On Thursday, June 4, 2026, Kyoto's rainy season officially began. The first Sunday after the announcement called for rain from morning until night. That was the Sunday I booked my visit to Saihō-ji. No reasonable person deliberately choo...

Most temples in Kyoto keep their gates open year-round. Hogonin does not. This sub-temple of Tenryu-ji opens to the public only twice a year — once in spring, once in autumn. The rest of the year, you can walk past its gate without reali...

The Bamboo Grove had been loud. Not loud like a city—loud like a crowd that has all decided, at once, to raise their phones above their heads. Selfie sticks. Shutter clicks. The shuffle of a few hundred people trying to photograph emptin...