Fushimi Inari Shrine
We have three more months in Japan and, as a result, we are starting to work through our lists of places to go, foods to eat and things to see. One of the things I really wanted to do before leaving was visit Fushimi Inari Shrine in Kyoto.
On Sunday we hopped on a train, with Aaron’s parents in tow, and made our way to Kyoto for our first day trip with Ewan.
We planned to keep the day light, it being our first with our babe and Aaron’s mom was a bit under the weather, so we wanted to hit up Fushimi Inari Shrine and Arashiyama. Fushimi Inari is famous for the hundreds of orange torii gates that line the pathways up the mountain. The torii gates are stunning and what most people go to see.
Some of them are quite tall.
Others were quite short.
Inari is the god of business. Each of the torii gates has been donated by a different Japanese business, so the backside of each one is inscribed with the name of the business hoping to get good fortune by their donation.
(Check out the lovely burp cloth that Aaron is sporting on his shoulder. This parenting thing is all brand new to us and makes us do very strange things!)
The shrine is also adorned with a number of foxes, which are known for being messengers. At this particular shrine the Ema (votive tablets) were in the shapes of foxes and those that purchased them and left their messages were free to draw their own fox face onto the tablet. I thought a lot of the faces were pretty fun to look at.
It was a good day, and a nice trip. I am not sure if we will get back to Kyoto again, I hope that we will. But if we don’t, I do feel that I have seen a lot of the city and I will always have very fond memories of my time there.