Nikkō, Tochigi Prefecture, Japan
A single, sincere prayer moves heaven.
—Shinto proverb
Futarasan, a Shinto shrine on the slopes of Mount Nantai (also Futarasan) north of Tokyo, rises like a shimmering ruby above the misty haze at the top of a deep gorge of the Daiya River. The shrine’s vermilion-lacquered Shinkyō (Sacred Bridge) straddles the river in a graceful arch, affording safe passage to this peaceful eighth-century A.D. Buddhist sanctuary. The temple venerates the kami (Shinto deities) of Nikkō’s three most sacred mountains: Mount Nantai (or Futarasan), Mount Nyoho, and Mount Taro.
If you yearn for a peaceful retreat from the turbulence in your life or for peace within on your path to enlightenment, visit Futarasan Shrine, which together with nearby Tôshôgû and Rinnô-ji form the Shrines and Temples of Nikkō, a World Heritage site. The best time to visit is in April, cherry blossom season, or early October, when the leaves change color. The train trip from Tokyo is about ninety minutes; the walk from Nikkō Station to the Sacred Bridge takes about twenty minutes, or you can take the five-minute bus ride. Or you can walk 220 yards from Tôshôgû or a take a forty-minute walk or ten-minute bus ride from Nikkō Station.
Meditate or pray for release from whatever obstructs or threatens your spiritual or inner peace.
The kami of Futarasan were the tutelary (protective) gods of the Tokugawa shogunate, and the shogunate’s founder and first shogun, Tokugawa Ieyasu (1543–1616), rests in eternal peace in Futarasan Shrine.