The beautiful shrine surrounded by forest
Shimogamo Shrine in Kyoto.
Shimogamo shrine is one of the oldest shrines in Kyoto, and a registered The World Cultural Heritage site. And also it has many beautiful and interesting fortune-telling, so I believe it’s worth to visit when you’re in Kyoto. I’ll introduce Shimogamo shrine for detail.
Shimogamo shrine
Shimogamo shrine has another official name Kamomioya shrine. It is one of the oldest shrines in Japan along with Kamigamo shrine. People can’t only see the attractive architectures but also Kawaii amulets, and so on!!
Walk through the magnificent forest…
Shimogamo shrine consists of 55 shrine buildings and a big forest approach called Tadasu-no-mori which has the virgin forest and streams flowing through the trees. It takes around 15 minutes to walk through Tadasu-no-mori from the first torii gate to Shimogamo shrine
Mysterious small shrine…
After you’ve passed through that forest, you can find an interesting tree which, is called Renri-no-Sakaki, two trees are mysteriously intertwined and have become one. The shrine next to the trees, called Aioi-sha shrine, is dedicated to the god of a good marriage.
Aioi-sha
連理の賢木【Renri-no-Sakaki】
Start here at stunning Torii…
Then finally you’ll get to the Shimogamo shrine. There is the striking vermilion two-story main gate which is 13m high, the corridor extends to the left and right.
Welcome to The Ancient Kyoto…
This stage, called Maiden, is the place where the Emperor’s ambassador performs the festival and the dance. At the time I visited there, that was on the New Year’s Day Eve, so they exhibited special calligraphies which means Oriental Zodiac. And in 2020.
The Main Shrine Here…
In the back of Maiden, there is the main shrine which is designated as the National Treasure. There are also Koto-sha shrines that has been worshiped as a guardian deity of the zodiac, and visitors worship at their own zodiac shrine.
Beautiful river in the precinct…
When you have finished your visit at Main hall and Koto-sha, cross the wheel bridge over Mitarashi River and go to Mitarashi-sha shrine. And people go there to see this clear water and do the interesting water Fortune-Telling using the river water.
Mitarashi-sha shrine
Mitarashi River
The Must-Do ‘Water Fortune-Telling…’
Then I have the recommendation of attractive things.
水みくじ【Fortune Telling paper】
How to do
① Draw a fortune-telling paper. A fortune-telling paper is a store, it’s in the back of the right side.
② Then pay 300 yen at the counter.
③ Your fortune-telling paper put in the river. Then texts comes out. Those texts tell your fortune. You can ask the people who work there to translate Japanese into English. If you wanna do that, why don’t you give it a shot!!!
Kawaii and Colorful Amulets…
Two Kawaii amulets for both man and women. “Himemori” is a female amulet, while “Hikomori” is a male amulet. This is one type, made of denim fabric. In addition, they also have an unusual envelope type amulets called ‘Musubimori’ and it looks so sweet!!
All Handmade!! No two amulets are exactly alike!!
Himemori
Musubimori
Lastly…
That’s all about 下鴨神社【Shimogamo shrine】. How did you like it so far?? Are you satisfied ??? If you have any questions and favor, please let me know here or twitter or IG. I hope you guys enjoyed this post as much as I did!! Thank you for reading !!!!
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・ Open: 6:30-17:00
・Admission Fee: free
・Official Web：https://www.shimogamo-jinja.or.jp
・Map：
※ informative reference(eBook)
Title: Kyoto 29 walks in Japan’s ancient captal
Publisher: John H. MARTIN and PHYLLIS G. MARTIN
Company:Tuttle Publishing; Vinyl Bound Paperback版