Daishoin (大聖院) Sponge Bob and Santa Pooh Bear
Are you ready kids?
“Aye Aye Captain!!”
I can’t hear you?!
“AYE AYE CAPTAIN!!”
Ohh…!!
Who lives on a jizo at Dai-sho-in?
“Sponge Bob Square Pants!”
And Santa Pooh Bear too!
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Fukuoka Hawk
Fukuoka hawk statue
The inscription under this statue says something about a hawk which rode on a ship in 1827 for 90 days before landing in Fukuoka. I’m not sure what the 1795-1877 signifies. In any event, the local baseball team in Fukuoka are the Hawks so maybe this story had something to do with their name.
The building in the background on the left is the Hilton Fukuoka Sea Hawk Hotel.
Historical, full-size ema
Giant ema pavilion (絵馬堂) @ Dazaifu Tenmangu Shrine (太宰府天満宮)
My retired history professor guide who took me to Dazaifu to check out Tenmangu pointed to the ceiling of this pavilion on the grounds and asked me if I knew what these items were. I did not. He then educated me on the history of the ema that are so common at shrines in Japan.
Currently, there are little wooden plaques (ema) that can be purchased for a few hundred yen to write your wishes on. Long ago, you could make a really large ema and pay a shrine to have your ema hung there. These giant ema at Tenmangu are hundreds of years old and still going strong. The owners, long since dead, have really gotten their money’s worth.
1 yen coins (一円硬貨)
1 yen coins jammed into rock overhangs on Shosenkyo hike
I was surprised to not see more hikers on my way up Shosenkyo (昇仙峡). Maybe I shouldn’t have been surprised given that it was a weekday and also the hottest day of the year (reaching more than 40 degrees Celsius). The top was fairly crowded though as most people drive to near the top or take a bus there. I took a bus to the bottom and walked my way up and down. The scenery was amazing. Along the way rocks created ceilings for part of trail and people had given up their coins to the cracks in the rocks.
Dewy rice paddies in Shirakawago
Fog lifting over Shirakawago on a dewy, summer morning
Tochoji pagoda and Buddhist prayer beads
Tochoji pagoda (Fukuoka, Japan)
According to wiki, Tochoji is most famous for having the largest statue of a seated Buddha in Japan. However, the one in Kamakura is several meters taller. Maybe they meant the largest wood statue of the Buddha. In any event, there is more to see at Tochoji, including the pagoda, pictured above, and the paintings of hell.