Nikko Trip
It was around 6:30am and I was wide awake. I lay in bed for a few minutes contemplating going back to sleep, but I just couldn’t bring myself to do it. Afterall I was already on the 3rd day of my 5 short days of vacation, and I’d barely left the apartment!
In much the same manner of a restless feline I delivered a series of seemingly unintended nudges to my wife’s inert form. (oh, was that MY claw in your cheek? huh. Well, since you’re up…) It didn’t quite work as I had planned, and I succeeded only in getting her to move from the bed to the kotatsu. Huddled under the blanket of the heated table napping seemed like an unavoidable eventuality.
We were saved from the ever-waiting jaws of lethargy, however, due to destiny’s devious designs. A strange alertness descended upon us in the form of a screaming contest being held by our various neighbors’ three screaming children (one per family. I still have no idea how these barely-cognizant toddlers organized such an extravaganza).
It took us all of 10 teeth-grinding seconds to decide it was high time for us to go on some sort of day trip anyway.
By 7:30 we had decided to go somewhere outside Tokyo – but not requiring shinkansen – and narrowed down the list to a few places with both cultural and scenic attributes. After a few calls and consultation with hyperdia and jorudan (critical transportation sites for anyone traveling unguided in Japan) we decided on Nikko! A full two prefectures north and with clean mountain water to boot – Goodbye Tokyo!!
>>Notes: 1. I tried to include mostly things you wouldn’t find on travel sites or travel guides, so there are actually very few pics of temples. 2. Most of these pics are with my keitai (mobile), so please forgive poor quality shots.
After taking local trains we arrived at Nikko station around 12:00 (we left at 9:30, but missed an earlier train due to delays) so were running a bit behind (the temples and shrines close at 3:30pm).
I purchased an all-day bus pass from the station attendant for 500 yen each (already a savings of 60 yen if you just use them to go to the temple grounds and back). However, due to bus schedule confusion (the bus will take you to the entrance of the grounds, but not the temple itself – obvious once you get there) because I misunderstood the bus driver we ended up not ever using the tickets at all! The tickets are actually a pretty cool little design, and I didn’t mind having them as a keepsake anyway.
It was a beautiful day and since the next bus wasn’t for 25-30 minutes we decided to leg it up to the temple by following a map the ever-helpful station guy gave us.
The path up to the temple actually runs right through the middle of the town which has a lot of very interesting shops and buildings. There were a number of antique shops selling odds and ends from a cool (IMHO) old shinkansen kids ride to old Japanese paintings to archaic padlocks to surprisingly good condition ABBA records (I checked?!). There were – I believe – two shops specializing in painting very stylized serpantine dragons. Also, and I didn’t know this before I went, but Nikko has some very fine micro-brewed beer. As I mentioned before they have delicious water, and their beer follows suit
Two notes here: 1. There are a few banks, but they close early, and the one conbini (convenience store) in town doesn’t have an ATM. 2. … actually the fact that there’s only one conbini was my 2nd point. Hmm. Well also there is a cool temple along the road (East side I believe) that is not even associated with the main series and therefore easily overlooked – we were its only visitors that I saw.
The road leading to the entrance of Tokugawa‘s shrine area is a pretty straight shot, and once we reached the end we were greeted by the inarguably scenic view of the over-photographed Shinkyo (God Bridge) which leads (or would lead if it were open) straight to the welcoming arms of the temple grounds.
The pleasant lamp-lined path leading to the central area was not the only one available by any means, and I would encourage anyone who visits to do a little exploring and not just follow the trail of people who’s ultimate goal, no doubt, is merely to see the “see-hear-speak no evil” monkey carvings. Well, that’s not fair, the main section is amazing, but I was shocked by the number of beautifully ornate temples and good-sized pagodas off the main path which seemed to go completely ignored.
The path itself is was bordered by the normal assortment of conifer and hardy mountain foliage that make up the majority of Japanese forests. Along with that was a row of kiosks running the length of the road selling predominantly edible products; kabobs(500yen), chocolate-covered bananas(300yen), cotton candy, Daruma-san etc…
The first area we reached was a large atrium surrounded by temples, a museum, and sporting one of the largest enclosed incense burners I’ve seen at a temple or shrine. It was fascinating watching people push their reluctant children into the billowing smoke and attempting to inhale as much as possible (incense bundles 100yen) before stepping away secure in their new found blessing. The incense purchase is honor based and there is simply a box with coin slots and a bin of incense (pictured here).
After taking our turn in the smoke we purchased the “combo-pass” strip of tickets necessary for each temple and then continued on. The strip has about six or seven tickets on it, each ticket sporting a black and white pic of the building it allows access into or whatever the building is famous for. The order you actually visit in doesn’t matter, though since they just take whatever ticket is on the bottom. I was a little worried about this at first since often that is the kind of thing Japan is picky about.
The first area we went to was the area with the buildings with the monkey and elephant theme. The monkeys I already mentioned. The elephants are of note because apparently the artist had only ever read descriptions of what elephants look like before carving the friezes. This seems …irresponsible? I suppose until you think about all the pictures and carvings of mythical creatures everywhere else. The biggest difference being of course that if the elephants hadn’t turned out as astonishingly accurate as they did it would be painfully obvious for the more pachydermally informed.
In one of the temples we ran into a couple of travelers from Canada that we had met earlier at the train station. I had helped them out with finding their hotel since they didn’t speak much Japanese. Since we were going opposite ways we just said hi and kept moving.
One area had a monk (from what I could tell) explaining to a rapt audience the part the temple played in the economic system of the Tokugawa Era. Everyone was sitting in seiza and as groups of people piled in the crowd of seated onlookers scooted further and further in to make room. Every time this happened the whole group took on the appearance of a low-speed knees-only marathon. Morbid, I realize, but positively mesmerizing.
Each section we went to had its own miko selling omamori specific to whatever the specialty of that temple happened to be; finance, education, health, etc… If you feel inclined to look into the back of each shop you can actually watch the temple workers studiously writing the prayers on each individual piece of paper which will later be placed in the omamori never again to see the light of day.
The final stop we decided on before the temple closed was the museum and garden area near the incense burner. By the time we got back they had started shutting off certain areas already and the only way into the garden was to go through the museum itself.
This made me sad because I had really been looking forward to going into the garden through the old wooden gate. It worked out in the end since the garden looped around and we ended up in that area again anyway. Apparently even though everything states that the temple stops admittance at 3:30 and you have to leave by 4, what it actually means is you have to be in by 3:15 and out by 3:50.
The museum was pretty normal fare for that era and most of the artifacts were paintings and manuscripts and an unusual number of incense holders. One thing that caught my attention was a note from President Grant thanking the emperor (I believe) for a pleasant visit! He had very lovely handwriting or at least someone on his staff did. At the very least he certainly had a dashing (if illegible) signature.
Even with a number of the areas under tastefully covered construction we still ended up not using all our tickets. Also if you happen to forget your camera you can always just pick one up from ye olde camera vending machine.
The sun was setting and it was getting chilly when we started back and we decided to try and find a place with Nikko-centric food for dinner before getting on the train. As with almost every area in Japan we were able to find a restaurant serving a special ‘Nikko only’ dish with some local veggies accenting what would have otherwise been a relatively commonplace shoyu ramen bowl. We split another local beer and with our bellies warm and full we started on the slightly longer trek home.
We took a train the wrong way for about an hour after accidentally falling asleep, but it turned out to be an interesting ride. There were many other people coming back from day trips and this lead to a sense of camaraderie and good humor among all the pleasantly tired-out passengers. I was especially surprised (since consumption of food and drink is uniformly discouraged on trains) by the unspoken acceptance of most everyone that it was okay to share a drink and have a bite to eat after a day well spent.
We finally got back home shortly before the last train and crashed before even unpacking. I hadn’t gone on a trip in quite a while, and after this trip I’ve really gotten a taste for it again. I’m really looking forward to the next one!
Cheers!
Tags: asia, beer, japan, nikko, President Grant, shrine, temples, Tokyo, Travel
wanderingned
