TNT Day 47 - scaffolded, again

 8 nov

Map 33: (capsule hotel) otsu station // train to Sakamoto-hieizanguchi Station -> Sakamoto Station // cable car to Enryakuji Station -> To-do ->Sai-to -> Yokotaka-yama -> yokawa -> ohara observation park (tent)

Clear and bright, a chill to the air

Instead of the 7km climb up Mt hiei, I opted to have a bit of a sleep in and then catch the cable car up to the top.

The Sakamoto cable car is Japan's longest cable car at 2025m long and takes 11 minutes to get you up (or down the mountain).

The cable car station offered some glorious views, I spent a good deal of time just soaking it in before starting my walk for the day.

Upon leaving the cable car station and walking along the trail I was met with a ticket booth. If I wanted to go through the temple, which the trail seemed to, I would have to buy a ticket. I'm sure there is probably a way to navigate the numerous temples without splashing out for a ¥1000 ticket, but I had taken the cable car to give me time to explore the mountain so I did.

The ticket got me into 3 different temple complex within Hieizan Enryaku-ji, the first of which was the To-do area. Unfortunate the main temple, kon-pon chu-do was under wraps for repairs, however, you could still enter the building and get a glimpse of how they go about repairing and replacing old/broken/rotting components.

There were lots of other temples, bell towers, pagodas, stone monuments etc. that I looked at within the complex.

Dai-ko do, training hall - some monks appeared to be visiting.

Amidado and the east pagoda

Monju Tower

Walking about 1km north I entered the Sai-to area.

Jodo-in - the most sacred area of Mt hiei as it is where Dengyo Daishi's (founder of Enryaku-ji) tomb is located. Monks who have been in seclusion for 12 years live here and worship him every day as if he were a living being.

Ninai-do 

Shaka-do - the oldest building on Mt hiei and central building of Sai-to.

Leaving behind the temples for now i started walking again, through this area the Tokai nature trail, for the most part, follows some of the numerous Kyoto trail sections.

As I hadn't ended up summiting Mt hiei I decided to take a small 200m detour up to the top of yokotaka yama instead.

Down the mountain I reached the last temple area, yokawa.

Yokawa chu-do - the main building of yokawa.

This area was much quieter than the other two.

Shiki ko-do

Leaving the yokawa, it was down down down into ohara, a smallish town with a mix of temples, flash hotels/onsens and agricultural plots - very picturesque.

I think this car was a prop piece for a shooting range, but it was still a surprising site.

My camp spot for this evening is a view point/park looking over some fields. To get to this area you cross a small bridge and shrine in front of an upmarket tourist food shop. As I was sitting around waiting for the sun to set before setting up, the man from the shop came to collect the shrine money. He asked me where I was going tonight and what hotel I was staying in. I conceded that I was going to camp here (on what might have been his land), he seemed hesitant to let me stay but after some deliberation and confirming it was just me and not a whole group he said okay but warned me it would be cold tonight (and he wasn't wrong).

12.8km, highest point: 751m, elevation: +630m -972m (skipped 7km by taking the cable car up Mt hiei)