30th December 2014, Tuesday
 |
| Nio-mon Gate |
Today, we were going back to Nikko again but this time we will be visiting the popular shrines and temples there. We left the hotel early today too but this time we bought our breakfast from 松屋 and then made our way to Tokyo Train Station. Then we went the same way as the day before to Nikko, but this time there was super foggy when we passed some towns. It was totally white in color, cannot even see anything outside and we saw a lot of snow. The temperature in Nikko is 0 degrees celsius and it was drizzling too. Today, we noticed there were more people going to Nikko, compared to yesterday. We reached there around 10.30 am and then we took the public heritage bus to the first temple which was the further away,
Taiyuinbyo Temple (This time, we didn't alight on the wrong bus stop). There were some remaining snow around the ground and the ground was also very wet. The temple was also under repair works, so one of the main gate was covered with scaffolds. There was a golden door which was shinning very brightly as the sun shone on it, when we first saw it, we were wowing. There was a Haiden-Honden Hall, which the halls were connected in a 'H' shape and it was built with gold too. There was a golden arrow which costs around $8800 yen and it is meant
for you to put at home as a charm to ward off evils. The golden arrow
was a weapon used by one of the gods standing guard at the gate.
 |
| "Hear no Evil, Speak no Evil, See no Evil" |
After exploring this temple, we walked to another temple. At the entrance of the temple, there were boxes where you put a small amount of money (eg: $100 or $300 yen) to buy a fortune paper/charm for yourself. We bought 1 small little stone, in the form of crescent shape which has different meanings for each individual color. Then we went in to another temple ground with the entrance fee $200 yen. Not sure what temple was that, there was some mini games which you can also play with them as you walk by. There were also very big trees which were more than hundred of years old. After spending some time exploring the temple, we walked down to
Toshogu Shrine, which was the oldest shrine in Nikko. The entrance fee for this temple costs $1300 yen per adult and there were some famous cravings like the sleeping cat, the see no evil, speak no evil and hear no evil monkeys. As we walked in, we saw the monkeys cravings on one of the houses. There were many difference cravings on the monkeys with different explanations like a mother monkey is looking at the future of the child...and the child grew to be independent. There were 2 big storehouses opposite the cravings too. After this, we reached the Yomeimon Gate. The Yomeimon Gate was under repairs, so the whole gate was covered with scaffolds. And as we entered, the golden door of the main shrine greeted us. The door was shining brightly too and it was made of real gold.
 |
| Sleeping Cat |
 |
| 600 years old Spiritual Tree |
We turned to the left side and went to the Sakashitamon Gate, where the staff checked our tickets for the sleeping cat shrine. There were many people around the temple, today a busy day it seems. We had to queue to go to the sleeping cat shrine. There was a famous craving on the sleeping cat on the gate and once we passed the gate, there was a long flight of stairs to climb up and it was very tiring to climb in cold weather. By the time we reached the top, we were panting. And the shrine wasn't very big, there were a priest that will ask everyone to come closer and he will start doing some ritual to bless all the people who came. Then he will ask everyone to walk in one direction to the back and back to the stairs for exit. We had to walk in single line and slowly, as we walked, we noticed there was another queue to pray to a big hole in a 600 years old super big tree. There was a sign that indicated that if you pray to the tree, your wishes will be fulfilled. We just walked up to the front and prayed at it and left...hohohoho...Then we went to queue to buy the sleeping cat bells for keepsake and went down the stairs to the main shrine. After that, we went to the main shrine which we had to take off our shoes to enter. Photography is not allowed in the main shrine and we just went in to take a look at the shrine. After visiting the main shrine, we went to the crying dragon shrine. Here too, the staff checked our tickets again. But my friend doesn't want to take off her shoes to go in the shrine. So i went ahead, my feet were frozen the whole day as we had to take off shoes a few times. Inside the shrine, i had to queue for my turn to go in the hall (at least no need to climb stairs again). As i moved in to the hall, i saw a very big drawing of a dragon up on the ceiling and there was a priest standing there and got everyone to come in as much as we can before he began. Then he began and introducing the crying dragon hall in Japanese...heheee...of course i don't understand what he is explaining. But at the later part of his speech, he took 2 blocks of wood and clapped them directly under the mouth of the dragon. And there was a bright ringing sound echoing back, but when he moved away from the dragon's mouth and clapped the woods again, there was no echo returned (very interesting..). So that's why the shrine is being called as Honjido Hall. There were also 12 Luo Han statues in the hall, which later i realized each one of the Luo Hans represent to each Zodiac animal. After the introduction by the priest, we were told to leave the hall by the other way, where purchases of the bells and charms are along the way out.
 |
| Crying Dragon Bells |
 |
| Long-shaped Bao |
 |
| Shinkyo Bridge |
I bought 2 of the crying dragon bells, cos the ringing of the bells was different from the normal bells. Very unique...hehehee...I gave 1 of the bells to my friend, cos she didn't went in to see the crying dragon. After the crying dragon shrine, we went out of the temple where there were some stalls outside the temple. We saw a stall selling baos, there was 1 interesting bao, it was long in shape which costs $50 yen. My friend so funny, she still asked me to wait for an ang mo to buy and then see his face whether he is happy or sad after taking the 1st bite. And guess what, the guy overheard us and turned around and told us the bao was still very hotz and he couldn't take the first bite yet. lol....Anyway we went ahead and bought 1 for ourselves to try...it wasn't that bad, quite nice actually. Then we walked down to
Rinnoji Temple, we ended up there but the main entrance was covered by a scaffolding, which had us confused. We thought we haven't reached the temple but actually we had reached. But anyway we saw the staffs starting to sweep the floor of the place and the tickets office were closed. So we didn't went in to visit this temple. Then we just walked the way down and saw the founder of Nikko Temples statue and the Shinkyo Bridge, which was the entrance point for Nikko's shrines and temples. It costs about $200 yen to enter the bridge. We took photos outside (without entering the bridge) before walking down the streets of Nikko to walk back to the JR train station. We passed a snack shop selling bbq rice balls, which we bought 1 stick to eat and post office where i posted postcards back to SG. It costs $70 yen to post to anywhere in the world...hehehe...Then we passed a Hello Kitty shop, where everything is Hellow Kitty item. It even has Hello Kitty Lucky bags, which i asked my friend to buy 1 for her friend who is crazy about Hello Kitty.
 |
| Fried Red Bean Buns..Must Try!!! |
 |
| BBQ Salmon |
Then we saw there was a long queue queuing at a stall, which was selling deep fried red bean buns. It was just opposite Tobu-Nikko station. We just went to queue for it too, without knowing what the stall selling at first. We bought 3 of them to eat on the train on our way back. And after getting the red bean buns, we walked to the JR Nikko station. Then it was the same route back to Tokyo station, the fried red bean buns were very yummy, should buy more of it. Went to check out the toilet on the train too, it was very big and spacious. This time we alighted in Ueno station and took the metro to Shinjuku. As this time was abit early when we reached there, most of the shops were still open. We went in to Uniqlo to shop around, it was a whole building with 4 or 5 levels of clothes to shop. We also went to BIC camera building to shop around and went to Japan's biggest
pachinko building. First time went inside to have a peek on the mini balls machines. We had our dinner at Ootoya inside one of the buildings there. I ordered pork cutlet set and my friend ordered the salmon. The salmon tasted much nicely than the port cutlet and so i was stealing her share on the fish...hehehee...After the dinner, we walked on the streets to find the Apple Store there. But we found out that the Apple Store is located in Shibuya and not Shinjuku using the displayed ipads in BIC Camera shop. After which we took the metro back to the hotel and rested after a long day.
Hotel Stayed:
APA Hotel - Hanzomon Hirakawacho
No comments:
Post a Comment