Koyasan

Before embarking on this trip, I suspected (correctly, as it turned out), that Kyoto would be overrun with tourists. I knew I wanted to experience a culturally significant site without too many tourists, and I also wanted to experience shokubo (temple lodging). Scanning through travelblog.org, I found that pretty much everyone who had blogged about Mt. Koya had a positive experience there. I decided to investigate further.

From my initial research, I learned that Koyasan is the spiritual center for Shingon Esoteric Buddhism, and that it has over 120 temples, with a significant number of them offering lodging. The cheaper lodgings seemed to already be fully booked. After some research, I settled on Jokiin, which appeared to be centrally located and had very good reviews. The price was a little steep at USD257 including dinner and breakfast, but it still wasn’t among the priciest ones by far. I took a deep breath and booked a room.

We left Kyoto at 8.30am on the rapid express train to Osaka. It only took about 30 minutes to get to Osaka Station. There, we transferred to a subway line to get to Namba station, where Nankai, a private railway company, operates from. We each bought a two day pass which included return train journeys and unlimited bus rides within Koya, all operated by Nankai. We calculated that our cost saving with this pass would only be minimal.

Prior to October 2017, getting to Koyasan used to be faster and more straightforward. A typhoon damaged part of the railway line, so the train now terminates at Hashimoto, and passengers bound for Koyasan are transferred to a bus. The hourlong bus journey took us up winding mountain roads before depositing us at a station. There, we transferred to a local bus to get to Jokiin. We arrived a little past noon. The journey from Kyoto took over three hours in all.

At Jokiin, we looked for a reception area but found none. We asked a passing worker for help, at which time he opened a sliding door and a friendly woman came out, took our bags, and told us to return at 3pm. As we had a few hours to kill, we walked into town, ate some lunch, looked at some of the temples, and then found a nice hiking trail through pine forests. The short trail ended at Nyonindo. Up until the middle of the Edo period, women were not allowed into the sacred part of Koyasan; they could not go beyond certain points on the outskirts of town. Nyonindo was one of the places where women could stay.

After looking at Nyonindo, we walked downhill back towards the center of town, explored a few more temples, and checked in for our stay at Jokiin. When we got there, the reception door was open, and a different woman checked us in, showed us around, and explained the schedule of events.

After checking in, we walked to the nearby Danjo Garan complex, a big, imposing complex with several stupas, halls, and other structures. As Koyasan is at high altitude, it was cold.

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