Kyoto Autumn Leaves without the Crowds

Walking along the lanes to Tofuku-ji, I suddenly wasn’t so sure whether visiting a temple famous for autumn foliage was a good idea when admiring Kyoto autumn leaves. It was busy, really busy. I had been lucky to get on the bus before Kyoto Station, where it filled up, then disgorged nearly all passengers at the Tofuku-ji stop.

I had just had been to some lovely more under-the-radar temples and shrines for Kyoto autumn leaves. Having never been to Tofuku-ji before, I wanted to see it, and the Kyoto autumn leaves season seemed to be a what the temple is known for, mostly. It was indeed beautiful, it was also very, very busy, and I enjoyed it a bit less because it was so crowded.

I have been on the fence whether to share the lovely lesser-known autumn leaf viewing spots at all. However, this blog is small, and the information I gathered here is freely available online, so I decided that I would to help you steer off the beaten path in Kyoto – which definitely is possible.

Information give here has been published at web sites like Kyoto City’s autumn leaf report, so these aren’t insider tips or secret tips – yet I was pleased to see that even on a weekend, I was part of a small group of leaf observers who enjoyed the autumn foliage mostly quietly. Please enjoy responsibly, and please tread quietly when visiting temples and shrines.

Shinnyo-do and Konkai Komyo-ji in central Kyoto

So, one early morning I got onto my bicycle and headed to some temples I had bookmarked in my map as ” good for Kyoto autumn leaves”. I cycled easily and quickly from my guesthouse near Kiyomizudera, soon leaving the crowded buses and traffic behind as I headed up some forested hill in central Kyoto

I am writing about these two temples together, although they are quite different temples, but geografically, they are close neighbours. Konkai Komyo-ji is a major temple of Jodo-Shinshu Buddhism (“True Pure Land”) and Shinnyodo is a temple of Tendai-shu.

Both these temples are a pleasant stroll up from Jingu-Marutamachi on Keihan Line or from the Higashiyama Station on the subway, or take a taxi or bus to Okazaki Shrine and walk up to the monumental Sanmon or the smaller Minami-mon.

This route will first lead you to Konkai Komyo-ji. The temple sits on a huge plot with many sub-temples, and although history buffs beg to differ, there is no real central attraction to the temple. You may enter most temple buildings for free, including the Main Prayer Hall.

The temple puts on some very good nocturnal light-up events in autumn, and I was surprised to see relatively few visitors and hardly any foreign tourists, when I visited in autumn, although the temple is very attractive. Most sites and sub-temples can be accessed free.

Walk uphill for five minutes past some very pretty peaceful subtemples. If the gates are open, you will be welcome to enter – thankfully, the temples are quite clear with their signage as to when one is welcome to enter and when not. Always remember to take off shoes when entering tatami areas or wooden verandahs.

After five minutes of leisurely walking, you will see Shinnyo-do, set in vast park lands, to your right. This temple sees even fewer visitors, and you can walk the grounds for free, and for paying a modest fee, you can admire several gardens and some monumental artworks like the Edo-era Nirvana painting.

Just bear in mind these artworks are not displayed year round, so it is best to ask before entering what is on display. On the shole, Shinnyo-do is even quieter, and has vast expanse of parkland to stroll in as well as many monuments and cemeteries in a garden-like setting.

From Shinnyo-do, you can visit some smaller shrines in the vicinity, or stroll down to Shirakawa-dori, cross that main road and walk across to Ginkaku-ji and the beautiful neighbouring temples of Honen-in and Anraku-ji. You will also cross the Path of Philosophy, which is a well known sakura and Kyoto autumn leaves destination, but will invariably be busier.

 

Ichioji: Far from the Madding Crowd

I was a bit torn whether going for the Higashiyama Hills again or attempt Hiei-zan and Enryaku-ji, or the famous Ruriko-in. In the end, I went somewhere fairly under the radar of foreign visitors. Although there were a fair few visitors, most appeared to be local, with a smattering of Westerners and Koreans, who were all appreciative and fairly well behaved.

Enko-ji, Shisen-do and Konpuki-ji are the three temples I visited, but there are a a few more temples and shrines in the area. You get there easily on City Bus No.5 from the Ginkaku-ji area or by Eizan Line Train (bit of a walk from the train station). I cycled – it is a straight ride up busy Shirakawa-dori, with a gentle incline, and you could take quieter side streets instead. There is free bicycle parking close to each temple.

Enko-ji

Enko-ji is a compact Zen (Rinzai School) Buddhist Temple founded by warlord Tokugawa Ieasu as an public educational institution. It has a couple of buildings and the prerequisite terrace or two from which an inner and an outer landscaped garden can be viewed, and a path up the hill for a bird’s eye view of the temple. Enamoured by how few visitors there were, I really took my time wandering the zen gardens and sitting and watching the colourful leaves. There was not too much to see interior-wise but it was very peaceful.

For Enko-ji you will need a reservation, made directly on the temple’s website. I visited in mid-November on a weekend – it was not very busy, and I did not have a reservation, either, and was just let in without being asked for a reservation. It cost about 1000JPY to enter.

Shisen-do

Just a short hop from Enko-ji, you find this gorgeous understated temple, along with a couple pretty Shinto shrines further up the hill. This is a temple of the Soto School of Zen Buddhism and a subtemple of Eihei-ji in Fukui Prefecture.

It started life as a hut where the Edo era scholar, poet, garden designer and tea master Ishikawa Jozan spent 30 years of his life. I Europe, we’d call him a renaissance man! He also created Shoseien Garden at Higashi Hongan-ji. Before retreating to the Higashiyama Hills, he was a trusted valet of Tokugawa Ieasu.

Here, a Buddhist nun sold me the ticket and goshuin and directed me to the main hall, where a considerable crowd was sitting admiring the extensive intricate gardens.

By eavesdropping on a lecture of some middle-class elderly Englishmen, I learned that the portraits gracing the halls were those of thirty-six Chinese poets, painted by an Edo painter – and some of Prince Charles and Lady Diana.

Altogether, this was perhaps my favourite, because of the attractive main hall with the verandah overlooking a very structured picturesque landscape garden. It also cost just 700JPY to enter.

Konpuku-ji

I had my fill of temples on that day and was keeping an eye on time, not wanting to miss my teatime and the matcha parfait at a famous tea shop the other end of town, but I did not want to miss the third temple marked on my map, less than five minutes by bicycle. This was the quietest of the three – nobody was there except the lady at the ticket booth.

The temple is perhaps best known for a place where the 18th Century poet Bashō, known in the for numerous, Haiku, spent many happy days in a retreat at the invitation of the abbot, and you can see a reconstruction of the hut overlooking the main temple hall.

It was very picturesque, and above all, very very quiet. This would be the temple to visit if you really would love a place all to yourselves, and I was amazed that they exist even in busy Kyoto. Entry fee was 500JPY.

Shimogamo Shrine

This UNESCO World Heritage listed shrine complex in pretty woodlands just near the confluence of the Kamo and Takado rivers in Northern central Kyoto has been on my wish list a while, and now I was saddle-fast on my bicycle and able to walk more than 200m in one go again, I set off one beautiful autumn SUnday morning along the Kamo River Cycle Path.

Before really getting started on my mission, I thought I’d enjoy Gion in the early morning before the hordes arrive and stopped of at Yasui Konpiragu where a few early birds were already busy breaking off bad relationships by crawling through its stone, and had a coffee in pretty Shirakawa-dori. We watched the wedding couples stroll by and I fled once the first tourist groups started to arrive.

I parked my bicycle at Kawai Shrine and walked in to find out this is the venerated “beauty shrine” where the ema is a mirror with a face drawn on it, for worshippers to fill in their beauty ideal and display the ema, along with a prayer. The shrine goddess is the mother of the Emperor Jimmu, Japan’s mythical first Emperor who ruled the country in the 7th Century BCE. It is actually a sub-shrine of Shimogamo Shrine.

Shimogamo Shrine was mildly busy with small family groups, pretty much all Japanese, with some decked out in beautiful traditional clothing. 

Shimogamo Shrine is one of Japan’s oldest shrines and rose to national significance during the Heian period when Kyoto was established as the capital of Japan and began to feature in classic literature of that period. It did not lose its popularity during the centuries that followed, and as such a cultural asset, was awarded UNESCO World Heritage.

It is indeed very nice, but there are no visual features that set it apart from other large shrines like Imamiya or Kitano Tenmangu-ji. It is very pleasant, because it is set in very large grounds, and has several maple and gingko trees for some pleasant leaf viewing.

Daitoku-ji and Imamiya Shrine

I kept cycling through some very pleasant well-to-do neighbourhood withy barely a car or a person in sight on this beautiful Sunday morning. 

Myoken-ji

I missed Myoken-ji, so much I was in a hurry to find lunch and visit every item on my itinerary! This small temple sits in a residential area and is not that well known or in any international guide books, so you may well have it to yourself on weekday mornings. It has historical connections to warlord Hideoshi Toyotomi, who regularly lodged here, and tea master Sen no Rikyu, who used it for tea ceremonies before his relation with Hideoshi soured. The tea house at the temple is said to be one of very few surviving from Sen no Rikyu’s lifetime.

Myokenji, though small in size, is a very active Zen Buddhist temple of the Soto School where you can join meditation sessions. It also also has nighttime illumination events during sakura and koyo season.

Michelin noodles at noon

Due to an early wake-up call and a small continental breakfast, I was quite hungry by now, and was delighted when I spotted what looked like two small queues. One was for Sarasa, a pretty cafe converted from an old bathhouse, the second one was a mystery queue. There was no menu, and maybe about ten people waiting. I had marked it on my map as a soba restaurant, but because I am too stingy to pay for a SIM card, I left it at that and joined the queue. Fifteen minutes later, we were duly welcomed to a small dining room with tatami mats, low tables and floor cushions. I’s day that was the biggest challenge for my freshly inserted hip joint, sitting politely on the floor, and getting up again without dislocating. I pointed to the joint in question and explained that the hip was new in Japanese, and they did not seem to take too much offence at me stretching my legs instead of sitting cross-legged or in formal seiza.

I enjoyed some very nice freshly made soba noodles. Only later did I learn that this restaurant was included in the Michelin Guide with a Bib Gourmand.

Imamiya Jinja

After lunch, I breezed on, across busy-ish Kitaoji-dori, through the quiet and green Daitoku-ji precinct. Imamiya Shrine is another ancient shrine, similar to Shimogamo, except this one is dedicated for protection from epidemics, or, generally speaking, where one can pray for good health.

So it was very appropriate for me to visit, seeing I was still recovering from surgery, even though I was speeding along nicely now on my mama-chari shopping bike, not looking very disabled at all right now, while still sporting a nagging limp when walking.

So, I paid my respects at a few of the numerous shrines, although I failed to lift the heavy rock that seems to be part of the divining at Imamiya Shine. In terms of leaves and prettines, it is easily on par with Shimogamo Shrine, and if you have time for just one place, I prefer Imamiya SHrine, not least for its traditional two aburamochi stands and the proximity to Daitoku-ji, where more artful zen gardens await.

And as for the abura-mochi, they should definitely be tried! Sold from two shops opposite each other, they stand for warding off the plague and other epidemics, and can be enjoyed in a beautiful shaded tea garden with a pot of tea.

Ichiwa is the older shop, allegedly being there right from the start when the shrine was built in the Heian period, and Kazariya opposite… well, that’s a few hundred years old too. I simple picked the one with the shorter queue, which happened to be Ichiwa. Their tea pots are blue with white dots whereas Kazariya’s are white with blue stripes as a distinguishing mark. Both serve the same and just one thing: the little rice cakes, rolled soybean powder and grilled on a charcoal fire, then drenched in sweet white miso sauce.

Daitoku-ji

By the time I reached peaceful nearby Daitoku-ji, the sun was already on their way down, and I had a kakigori date to keep. So, which temple to visit?

Daitoku-ji is a very large complex of Buddhist temples of the Rinzai Zen School of Buddhism. It has over twenty subtemples, of which Daisen-in and Ryogen-in are perhaps the most famous. Daisen-in is considered one of the five most important Zen temples of Kyoto. Ryogen-in has at least five different zen gardens including a tiny one, which is said to be the smallest rock garden in Japan, the famous “crane and turtle” rock garden and a very intricate miniature landscape garden.

Another very atmospheric one, Koto-in, has been closed to the public since the pandemic. 

The subtemple I had planned to visit, Ohbai-ji, was on a special opening for koyo only, but photographs were not permitted, so after a bit of consideration and feeling a little tired after too much beauty, I decided that I would return to Daitoku-ji at some point in the future and cycle across town so that I would have enough time at a celebrated kakigori place.

Just as it got dark, I pushed my trusty bicycle back to the shed at my guesthouse and bid goodbye to Higashiyama.

The next day, I visited Tofuku-ji and it was super busy, and the experience was different. I know, it’s famous for autumn leaves, but I was grateful to have had some very peaceful, less crowded leaf viewing weekend!

Where I stayed

This time, I wanted to be based in one place, since I did not have that much time in Kyoto, but that did not work out. I finally got the chance to stay at the lovely Guesthouse Soi, a very professionally run spick-and span guesthouse at the foot of Kiyomizudera. I had a nice-sized private room suitable for a solo traveller with a little tatami area, loads of room for luggage, a comfy futon, and spotless shared bathroom. And as a cyclist, I was delighted to find they rent really nice bicycles for 500 JPY a day. You can walk to Kiyomizudera and Gion easily, and it is about 300m from the main road, quiet location, but convenient for bus routes.

Because Guesthouse Soi was booked for my last night, I had the rare chance to stay at Gallery Nozawa Inn, which is usually fully booked, too. A wonderful old Kyoto townhouse converted into just two guest rooms, with the couple running it living on site and looking after you like well beloved house guests. It’s in a lovely old area, close to the former Shimabara entertainment district, full of atmosphere and history. It’s a 5-minute walk to the nearest bus stop, and Kyoto Train Station is just 1km away.

The Small Print

I visited Japan a few times since 2004 and even studied in Japan for a short period, but I started on the capsule hotels fairly late. All were paid for by myself, no sponsorships. I am particularly grateful to First Cabin Kansai Airport for accommodating me and a fellow female traveller when we were stranded, thanks to a technical fault on our Finnair plane with Finnair basically not doing anything to accommodate those stranded. The only form of advertising you will find here are affiliate links to Booking.com, which is where I booked all my capsule hotels. Find more on my affiliate link policy here.

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