Taking the Big Break

The family part way up the mountain.

Today, I learned the color of vermilion.   Apparently, this orange–red color is so disliked by evil spirits that many shrines and places of honor in Japan are painted in this bright orange color.  Today, we went to Fushimi Inari shrine most famously known for the many thousands of Torii Gates (and even more steps!) lining the pathway up to the top of Mt. Inari.

Just one stop south of Kyoto station, at the base of Mt. Inari, is the famous Fushimi Inari Shrine.   The shrine was built to honor the god Inari Okami, the god of rice, fertility and sake.  (Inari is also a patron of business. To honor Inari, businesses across Japan have donated a torii gate.  In return, the name of the business name is written on the back of each torii along with its donation date.)

Fushimi Inari Shrine

Inside the Fushimi Inari shrine.

I have written a post already about shrines and the importance of the Ema prayer board.  Wishes are written these boards and hung at temples for the gods to read.  The ones at Fushimi Inari were so cute that I considered buying and writing on one of these adorable prayer boards.

Hanging Ema

But in the end, I decided I couldn’t have said it better than this one by Anne Marie from Canada.

Ema

Behind the shrine begins the long stair climb up and up and up the mountain.   Thousands of torii gates lend a bright, cheerful color to the hike as you walk through them, and there are literally hundreds, if not thousands, of small sub-shrines all along the path up.   I was not able to figure out the significance of all of them but it seriously felt like there really were thousands.

Hiking up Mt. Inari through the beautiful torii gates

Torii Gates

After about 30 minutes of climbing up the mountain, we took a path through some temples and ended up way off the beaten track in the middle of a beautiful forest.   First, we walked through a giant bamboo forest, followed by a smaller bamboo forest.   It was a bit surreal.  Trekking through here, I half expected a poison dart to fly past my head or bolder to come rolling toward me.  Beautiful, but eventually the untraveled path became impassable so we turned back and continued up the mountain steps.

The hike itself took several hours but we took our time, stopping along the way.   Half way up we stopped for ice cream before continuing on to the top.

We went up.

And up.

And up.

The god Inari’s favorite messengers were foxes, so on our temple hike today, we saw many fox statues and shrines all the way up the mountainside.  The foxes are usually represented in pairs.   One holds a gemstone in his mouth, representing the spirit of the gods.  And, the other holds a key, said to be of the rice storehouse.

Foxes at one of the shrines

On the way back down, we stopped at the same little café for the popular “Fox Noodle Udon”.  This noodle dish includes fried tofu, said to be a favorite food of foxes.

Break for lunch

Eating our Fox Udon

Eating our lunch overlooking the city of Kyoto, we rested up for the rest of the trip down which felt easy after all the stairs we’d climbed up the mountain.

View of Kyoto from a spot near the top.

Going back down.

We all enjoyed our day of hiking.  The weather was warm but we took it slow and enjoyed the hike.  In addition, both Lorenzo and I really enjoyed taking photos of the gorgeous shrine and beautiful gates up the mountain.   If you are planning a trip to Kyoto, this shrine is a must see!