Fushimi Inari-taisha, Kyoto 2016

The Fushimi Inari Taisha (伏見稲荷大社) shinto shrine in Fushimi-ku, Kyoto is awesome. It is the head shrine of Inari, the kami (spirit/god) of foxes, of fertility, rice, tea and Sake, of agriculture and industry, of general prosperity and worldly success, and one of the principal kami of the Shinto faith. There are thousands of Inari shrines in Japan, and actually we went to a smaller one in Tokyo.

Thursday morning- Us in front of the Two-storied Gate

You start at the base of the Inari mountain with the two-storied gate followed by the main shrine. As you follow the trail up the mountain you go through Torii gates and visit the other smaller shrines until you reach the top of the mountain which is 233 meters (764 feet) above sea level. We were told it would take us about 2 hours to walk up and took almost exactly that amount of time (counting the time it took me to snap hundreds of photos).

Main shrine

Map shows main gate, main shrine, torii, and other shrines

Monks visiting the main shrine

We visited a lot of shrines and temples on our visit to Japan but what was really special about this site were the Torii gates and the way they interacted with the natural beauty of the mountain. Torii gates were the inspiration for The Gates art installation in Central Park in 2005 by the Bulgarian artist Christo Yavacheff and French artist Jeanne-Claude. I've been disappointed I missed that exhibit while it was in New York, but now I've seen the original and it's amazing.

I love the Torii Gates

Senbon Torii (1000 Gates)- The place where the gates are side by side.

Cool from the this angle 

And from this one

Look up!

The gates were different heights and there were varying amount of spaces between them and the natural setting changed from area to area. All of this contributed to a different feeling as you went through each area.

The were higher and more spaced

A shrine area along the way

View of Kyoto

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View of Kyoto behind me. We're about 75% of the way up now.

Another shrine-type area

I was feeling pretty proud of myself. The hike felt challenging to me and I hadn't complained at all about the millions of steps we had been going up. Then I saw an old Japanese lady chugging along in front of me at about an equal or faster pace and I no longer felt proud. I felt like a whiney American.

San no mine (near fox cloud on map)- with my new old lady inspiration

Ichi no mine- near the top of the mountain

The top of the mountain itself was not that well marked or that exciting- but we were happy to see the entire site.

Top of the mountain selfie!

My fox imitation- also how I feel after hiking a mountain

On the way back down now

On the way back down

Gozendani worship place

Tied up fortunes