Second Trip to Kyoto? Go North: Kurama's Mountain Temple, Riverside Kaiseki in Kibune & the Valleys of Ohara — 2 Days

Between the forks of the Kamo River survives a twelve-hectare slice of primeval forest with trees six centuries old — and at its heart, one of Japan's oldest shrines, older than Kyoto itself. Walk the long gravel approach under the canopy first; the forest is the point, the vermilion gates the reward.

Grounds free, ~6:00–17:00. World Heritage. Demachiyanagi Station — the Eizan railway terminus — is a 10-minute walk south.

A small private railway with oversized windows and seats turned to face them, built for the tree tunnel between Ichihara and Ninose — fire-coloured in November, green-gold in fresh-leaf season. Thirty minutes from city grid to cedar mountains, no reservation, the cost of a coffee.

¥470 Demachiyanagi→Kurama; Kirara runs interspersed with regular trains — check the timetable, or take any train (all stop at Kibuneguchi/Kurama). Window seats are first come.

The mountain temple where the boy Yoshitsune is said to have learned swordsmanship from the tengu king, and where reiki was born. Climb (or cable-car) to the main hall's terrace, then take the trail over the ridge — past the serpentine cedar roots of Kinone-michi and the Mao-den hall — down into Kibune. One of Japan's great short walks.

Mountain entry ¥500; cable car ¥200 (approx., 2026). Gate hours 9:00–16:15. Trail ~75 min, moderately steep — proper shoes; closes during weather warnings, check after heavy rain.

The trail delivers you to the back of the water god's shrine — headquarters of four hundred and fifty Kifune shrines nationwide. Descend to the famous lantern stairway, then float a blank fortune slip on the sacred spring and watch your luck surface in ink.

Grounds 6:00–20:00 (May–Nov); free; mizuura-mikuji ¥300 (QR translations). The lantern steps are photogenic at dusk as the lights come on.

Fujiya built Kibune's first dining platforms over the river a century ago, and the formula remains perfect: tatami a metre above rushing water, the air ten degrees kinder than the city, kaiseki of river fish and mountain vegetables arriving as the lanterns blink on. Summer dining as Kyoto has refined it.

Courses roughly ¥10,000–24,000 (approx., 2026); season May 1–Sep 30, platforms close in heavy rain (indoor rooms as fallback). Reserve 2+ weeks ahead for weekends. The restaurant shuttles guests from Kibuneguchi Station.

At Yase, where the Takano River leaves the mountains, moksa reads its location as a brief: thirty-one rooms of clay, wood and paper, three private saunas tuned to different temperaments, and breakfast porridge from a wood-fired kitchen. The name means liberation; after the mountain day, it delivers.

From roughly ¥45,000/night for two (approx., 2026); book sauna slots when reserving. Taxi from Kibune ~20 min (arrange ahead — they are scarce at night), or Eizan line to Yase-Hieizanguchi.

Ohara's great monastery garden: cryptomeria trunks rising from moss like columns in a green cathedral, stone jizo half-buried in the carpet, and in the Ojo Gokuraku-in hall a thousand-year-old Amida triad leaning gently forward — coming to meet the dying, as the iconography intends.

8:30–17:00 (winter 9:00–16:30); ¥700 (approx., 2026). Arrive at opening; tour buses reach Ohara mid-morning. Taxi from moksa ~15 min.

Entry includes matcha and a sweet, served where you sit: on tatami facing the gakubuchi teien — a garden composed to be viewed through the room's pillars as a living painting, anchored by a pine seven hundred years old. The ceiling boards above you came from Fushimi Castle's last stand. Sit until the tea goes cold.

9:00–17:00; ¥900 including matcha (approx., 2026). Two minutes beyond Sanzen-in's gate — most visitors miss it, which is the charm.

Across the valley, a small nunnery holds one of Japanese literature's heaviest rooms: here Kenreimon-in, sole survivor of her clan's drowning at Dan-no-ura, prayed out her remaining decades — and here the retired emperor visited her, the scene that closes the Tale of the Heike. The walk over, through market gardens, is part of the text.

9:00–17:00 (seasonal shifts); ¥600 (approx., 2026). ~20 min walk from Hosen-in across the valley floor.

A teahouse on the old Wakasa fish road since 1576, now in its twenty-first generation: kaiseki built around mugitoro — barley rice under grated mountain yam — and grilled fish that recalls the road's original cargo. Garden rooms face the Takano River; four and a half centuries of travellers have stopped exactly here, for exactly this.

Lunch kaiseki roughly ¥4,400–6,600 (approx., 2026); reserve a few days ahead (irregular closures). On the route back — 10 min from Ohara by taxi, 1 min from Eizan Shugakuin Station.

End inside Daitoku-ji's walls at the subtemple of the Christian daimyo Otomo Sorin, where Shigemori Mirei raked his 1961 'Garden of the Cross' — waves of gravel breaking around stones set, faintly, in a crucifix. Four centuries of Zen and a modernist's hand, with almost no one else watching.

9:00–17:00 daily; ¥400 (approx., 2026). Note: the famous Koto-in subtemple remains closed (since 2020) — don't detour for it. Taxi to Kyoto Station ~25 min.