Eigenji

Eigenji sits in Shiga the way most sacred sites in Japan do: unhurried, and easy to rush past if you don't know to slow down.

Eigenji is the head temple of its own branch of Rinzai Zen, founded in 1361 in a bend of the Aichi river where the valley narrows, and it is the best known autumn temple in Shiga. The approach crosses a bridge over the gorge and climbs a flight of stone steps under maples that close overhead, and the peak in mid-November draws a volume of people the small valley road struggles with.

Outside those three weeks it is a working Zen monastery in a quiet river valley with almost nobody in it. The precinct holds a set of stone rakan figures on the slope above, carved in the eighteenth century and scattered among the trees rather than arranged, which are more interesting than the temple buildings and which most autumn visitors walk straight past.