A Bouquet Of Trees

The temple so nice, they named in thrice! Call it Danzan, call it Tonomine or call it Tanzan, this shine located two stops down the line from Yagi station dates back to 678. It’s been pretty much a year. I’ve seen many, MANY temples and shrines. They’ve all started to meld and blend into one another and whereas the first one I viewed all starry eyed in amazement in wonder nowadays these can be pretty ho-hum unless there is some feature that stands out setting it about from the rather duplicating nature of Japanese temple and shrine construction. This place is famed for two things. The first one is the Kemari festival that takes place at the start of November. Picture to yourself a bunch of monks in traditional, Japanese robes, brightly colors and flowing, with little pirate-hat like headpieces kicking around a deer skin ball in a game of Devin football and you got yourself Kemari. It is believed that Prince Naka-no-Oe would secretly meet Kamatari Fujiwara here to discuss the Taika Reforms of Japan over games of kickball. Thus a tradition is born and every year on the second Sunday in November you can watch the monks reenact these meetings with a game of their own. I missed this festival. The weather was bad and, besides, the other attraction, the one I was mainly interested in, hadn’t chosen to reveal itself yet. The colors of the autumn season are the second thing that draws tourists to Tanzan. Like Yoshino when it comes to cherry blossoms, Tanzan is said to be one of the most beautiful places in Japan when awash in the colors of the season. I’ve been saving this place. It’s the last shrine on my list and purposely I’ve drawn out visiting it until now so I could see some of those colors for myself. I wouldn’t be disappointed.

You have two options in getting up the mountain to visit the shrine. You can go by bus or you can go through the courtesy of your two feet. Knowing my competence with maps, and the one handed to me at the train station was one of those cartoony deals that scarified accuracy for cuteness, I opted for the bus. I figured it'd be a pleasant ride up the mountainside passing beautiful fall foliage on the way. No, sir. The bus was packed with people…check that, the bus was packed with ELDERLY people. I think the general age on that bus was 103. I was the youngest person there. In fact, you could multiply my age by three and I’d still be the youngest person there. I wondered why youth wasn’t as interested in things like fall foliage over an ancient Japanese temple. Then again, it could have just been Seniors Day. So we’re rolling along with the old folks heading on towards the mountain when I get this feeling that we’re actually not rolling along to anywhere. This bus had taken on the characteristics of the elderly folks that populated it because it was moving about three inches an hour. I had a Fuji flashback remember how, when nearing the top, we would move a few feet, stop for five minutes and then repeat that entire process in our slow prod to the summit. Here it was the same thing only I was on a bus. It was like being caught out in Toronto traffic of the Gardnier Expressway. The seats had all be taken so I plopped myself down on the side door steps. This got a few looks from the old folks. Well, let them gawk. By the time the first 35 minutes of this bus trek had rolled around my head was aching from the smell of perfume and I was wishing I’d have just walked. At least then I wouldn’t have to worry about permanently smelling like lavender!

But it was all very much worth it. Hell, even the bus ride back I swore I wouldn’t take because of how sluggish the ride there was, that was even worth it. The farther up the mountain you went the more the colors exploded out at you. First a patch of yellow, a golden yellow gleaming in the sun, and then a bright splash of red…just this beaming crimson. I’d never seen fall colors this vibrant. It was the difference between regular television (Ontario autumn) and HD-TV (Japan autumn). A friend of mine after viewing the images over on Facebook described it all as good as I can: “It’s like a bouquet of trees.” I spent a lot of time on that mountain, more then I’d planned on, and though the shrine was nice I was enamored by the pallet of nature. I walked away from the crowds at the shrine and went deeper into the woods until I found some steps leading above the shrine. I walked into the yellows and reds and oranges, higher up, until I realized that I wasn’t going to get a good view of the valley below due to the blockade of trees. I trucked on back down and would find enough patches of autumn for the camera to embrace before taking the bus back to the train station.