Visit to Nikko | Nikko, Japan

Nikko, Japan: This place was Great; This is a Ticket Office!

Nikko is outside Tokyo, about 3 hours north in the mountains. The setting is absolutely spectacular, among streams and huge trees, it reminds me of the area around Big Sur. This time of year the leaves are every shade of red orange and yellow. The only difference is that Nikko happens to have a mind boggling assortment of Buddhist Temples and shrines erected in honor of Shogun Tokugawa in the 17th century (the first temples actually date to the 8th century, but they were deemed a too understated for the supreme dictator's tastes). For those of you who have read Shogun, I am talking about Toranaga. The basic plot is true, there was an Anjin-san (his real name was William Adams) and a musket regiment, and Toranaga (actually Tokugawa) defeated Ichido and the forces supporting the Taiko (righful heir), then made himself supreme dictator, kicked everyone out and shut Japan off from the world for 250 years. I was probably more excited to learn the book was true than to see the actual shrines. But Nikko is living proof that being supreme dictator has a lot of perks. Amazingly ornate wooden carving details huge Temples and tiny outbuildings alike. There are guilded stautes everywhere and inside they go all out, solid gold Buddhas 30 feet tall among other things. One of the pictures attached one of the palaquins that royalty used to get around. Amazing how small they were, I dont think anyone taller than Gary Coleman could actually fit in one, but being made out of solid gold and having servants carry you whereever you went probably had a certain social cache. The whole complex stretches for miles and contains Temples for multiple different sects of Buddhists, all honoring Shogun Tokugawa, and seperate complexes of shrines for the tombs of the Shogun and his Grandson, who actually carried out the work on the site. The scope is absolutely astonishing, and just as amazing, the number of people herding through to see it all. In a few rare respites I found myself alone at a minor shrine deep in the woods or 200 steps up the side of a mountain and the crisp air, radient leaves and skyscraping trees truly provided a sense of awe that all the man made wonders never approached. That being said, there is some pretty amazing stuff strewn all over that mountainside. My favorite were the diverse and colorful guardian statues positioned at every gate (of which there were countless numbers). The gates had gates, and you had to go through the gates to get to them. Lions and samurai and demons...Oh my. Check out all of these crazy statues and tell me which one you like best. Also be sure to check out the changing leaves...absolutely stunning. I almost forgot a few little tidbits of useless informaition that I thought might interest Mike or other mechanically inclined people. One of the shrines has a 30m tall pagoda, quite a feat for the 1600s. And in earthquake country no less. Supposedly (they wont let you in) there is an 80 foot tree trunk suspended from the top hanging down into the main chamber. The whole thing just sits on its foundation and so it rocks back and forth in an earthquake, but the tree trunk is supposed to act as a counter balance to keep it from tipping over. Not sure what the math works out to on that, but I can vouch that its still standing almost 400 years later so they must have done something right. The other intersting thing is that all of these world heritage monuments are surrounded by 200 foot tall trees (they look like redwoods) and everyone is deathly afraid that one of them is going to crash down and take out the Great Buddha, so if you look closely, all of the trees are lashed together with 3/4 inch steel cables. If you can crane your neck high enough the tree tops are home to the world's largest spiderweb, or maybe the set for Robin Hood Prince of Thieves. That's it for now. Off to Kyoto on Monday where the main attraction, I'm told, is Temples. I'm beginning to see a pattern here...