2015 » Yamadera

After spending most of the day in Matsushima, we headed back towards Sendai to make a connecting train towards a small town called Yamadera. Yamadera itself is a tiny village just outside the Myabi district which in itself is pretty unremarkable, a shop, a cafe and a few houses however up in the mountain behind it is a set of temples that lead to its peak. The journey itself is about 1.2-ish kilometres leading you to a height of a kilometre above the town below. The journey up is initially through some woodland and graveyards, before getting to the higher reaches where it thins out and becomes dominated by shrines, temples and housing for the people who work in them. There are also a lot of stairs, I really mean a lot, like millions! The time of day we'd ended up choosing (by fact of us deciding so late in the day) meant the local tourists had all but gone home and the way back gave way to some beautiful sunset views and a walk through the forest and graves at dusk which gave a hauntingly weird but quiet feeling.