Kamakura, the capital of Japan from 1185-1333, now a smallish city of 170,000, is situated on the Shizuoka side of Tokyo and packed with notable cultural sites, many linked by wooded hiking trails. After making a list of the sights I wanted to visit, I plotted my course: an 8-kilometer loop around the city with a quick streetcar ride to finish the day.
From the 6:45 Sunday train, the glowing view of Mt. Fuji prevented any napping. At Odawara I bid the bullet train goodbye, and took the local line into Kamakura, the town still sleepy at 9 a.m.—the fall colors were in full swing and the sky was clear and bright.
My first stop was Hachimangu, a colorful Shinto shrine with a sprawl somewhat like Kyoto’s Kiyomizu-dera.
Kamakura is home to five important Zen temples and my next stop was the foremost—Kencho-ji—still active as the oldest Zen monastery in Japan. The massive junipers are said to have been planted over 700 years ago by Kencho-ji’s founders.
By the time I continued my loop to Engaku-ji, many more visitors had come out to enjoy the perfect weather. The grounds of this second-most-important Zen temple were crowded with bright yellow ginkgo trees, fiery red Japanese maples, and lots of folks doing this:
...And the trees were steaming!
Through a bamboo grove and up the stairs was a nice view of Fuji (looking back toward Shizuoka).
From Engaku-ji I moved on to the much quieter Tokei-ji, a temple that historically served as a women’s shelter. If a married woman came to this temple, after three years of service she would be granted a divorce. Now, the buildings are surrounded by cypress forest and the gravestones of women who once called this place home.
After grabbing a bite and another dose of coffee, I entered Jochi-ji and the start of the 3.5-km hiking course that would wind past several shrines and end at the second-largest Buddha in Japan. I happily found this hiking course a real hike—tree roots, loose rocks, and muddy dips aplenty on this ridgetop trail through the forest.
A slight detour took me past the small shrine, Kuzuharagaoka; into Genjiyama-koen, a sidewalk-riddled landscape park; then into Zeniarai-benten, a shrine entered through a tunnel, with a cave wherein people wash their money with the hope of this bringing riches.
Through another tunnel—this one of torii gates—was Sasuke-jinja, then signs put me back on track to the Buddha.
Japan’s largest Buddha is on display in Nara, near Kyoto, but the second-largest was impressive enough for me. On its pedestal, the bronze Kamakura Daibutsu is 13.4 meters tall and weighs about 121 tons. It used to be indoors, but the first hall built around it blew away in the 1300’s, then the next was washed away by a tsunami in 1495.
If you’re willing to wait in line, you can even climb up inside and take a look out the back windows.
And finally, the last stop on my list…Hase-dera, a temple complex with an interesting legend. Straight from the Hase-dera guidebook: "In 721 AD the pious monk Tokudo Shonin discovered a large camphor tree in the mountain forests near the village of Hase in the Nara region. He realized the trunk of the tree was so large that it provided enough material for carving two statues of the eleven-headed Kannon. The statue he commissioned to be carved from the lower part of the trunk was ennshrined in Hase-dera temple near Nara; the statue from the upper half (actually the larger of the two) was thrown into the sea near present-day Osaka with a prayer that it would reappear to save the people. Fifteen years later in 736 on the night of June 18, it washed ashore at Hagai Beach on the Miura Peninsula not far from Kamakura, sending out rays of light as it did. The statue was then brought to Kamakura and a temple was constructed to honor it."
The Hase Kannon—Kannon being the Buddhist goddess of mercy—is 9 meters tall, was covered with gold leaf in the 1300’s, and indeed has eleven heads in addition to its main face. Heads positioned in all directions are intended to symbolize the Kannon’s willingness to hear the prayers and wishes of diverse people (no photos allowed in the hall).
Thousands of little Jizo statues line the way to a smaller shrine on the Hase-dera grounds. The toys piled at the front of this shrine add sobering evidence to the fact that Jizo is the bodhisattva of departed children; the statues and toys have been placed here to comfort the souls of unborn children, lost to miscarriage, abortion, and so on.
After taking a stroll around the koi-stocked ponds and taking in the view of Kamakura and the Pacific’s Sugami Bay, I took an old-school streetcar from Hase to Kamakura’s central station, got some food and bought some special edition Shizuoka Wasabi Kit Kats, then retraced my route home. A flawless daytrip in the perfect time of year..JPG)
After a Suwa Lake overlook/coffee stop (southwest of Nagano City), we drove through ravines and mountain tunnels to the village of Narai-juku, a "Nationally-designated Important Preservation District of Historic Buildings”—such nomenclature I can't make up. Narai-juku was an important post town, situated midway between Kyoto and Edo (now called Tokyo) on the Nakasendo Road, and the buildings on the main street, once used to house and feed travelers crossing the nearby mountain pass, have remained very much the same since that period. The village is also famous for laquerware, and for crafting the Nagano 1998 Olympic Games medals.
Mid-morning snack: soba-cha and a miso-walnut stuffed bun.
We next drove past Mt. Ontake, then Eiko's guidebook directed us to a roadside stop where we had an impromptu little picnic beneath the train tracks, next to some huge scramblin' rocks and a green-blue bend of stream. 
Back in the car, we continued to wind through mountain passes into the afternoon, still in Nagano-ken, eventually arriving at historic destination #2. Wish I could recall the name of this village; its winding stone walkways were lined with restaurants and shops, leading up a hillside overlooking a stretch of colorful valley.
Eiko demanded I pose with all the festive folks we encountered...
Despite the coolish temps, there was still much farming going on in the area: apple orchards, pear trees, fields of lettuce and cabbage…plus these giant Japanese radishes and mega-mushrooms.
Our set lunch: I ate everything but the fish, which Eiko and Kaori gave me crap for as they bit off and swallowed the heads of their fish. I appreciate the nothing-wasted view, but there are some things I just can’t…
The sunset intensified and I began to wonder about our time frame for getting back to Shizuoka. Not that I wasn't having fun; the ladies were highly entertaining and we were seeing all sorts of sights I'd never have found on my own. 
After grabbing more unnecessary snacks for the final stretch, we drove out of the hills and onto the expressway. I was drifting in and out of sleep in the backseat during the 3-hour drive through Toyoda, Nagoya, Hamamatsu, and back to Shizuoka. My dictionary and I were completely exhausted by the time Kaori pulled into my driveway at Otowa-cho, where I thanked them a zillion times and we planned to get together for dinner sometime soon.
