Your Local Shrine

Writing these travel lessons tends to be a bit difficult for me.

The thing is, my favorite places to visit in Japan have always been the little places that do not warrant entries in travel books. I get fascinated by the random hole-in-the-wall restaurant, the unexpected shrine right around the corner.

Accordingly, the overwhelming majority of places in Japan that would qualify as my favorites are places I haven't discovered yet.

After all, I've only glimpsed a minuscule portion of this country.

That's why one of my top-recommended "destinations" is the local shrines near wherever you happen to find yourself in Japan.

For example, when I first studied in Japan wayyyyyy back in the fall of 2009, I was staying in a dorm in 和光市 (わこうし // Wakō [City]), which is just across the border of Tokyo and Saitama:

One fine day, I took a walk with my friend Harry, who I mentioned in our exploration of Nikkō.

On our walk around the Wakō area, we came upon an awesome fox cave!

We navigated the dark tunnel, the light fading behind us, our not-yet-smart phones dimly lighting our way.

In the depths of the cave, we found a fox shrine:

This, I thought, is the coolest.

After exiting the other end of the cave, by the way, we found a light switch that lit up a string of lights that went through the cave. Oops.

The cave was on the grounds of this shrine:

I don't know if something like a little fox cave warrants a trip all the way out of Tokyo. The point I want to make, instead, is that there are treasures like this all over the country.

Here's one way to find them:

First, open up Google maps and navigate to where you're staying. Here's the Wakō area, for example:

Type 神社 (じんじゃ // shrine) into the search bar, and it should come up with a number of local shrines:

Then just go for a walk and see what you find.

Clicking around, it seems that this is the fox shrine we stumbled upon:

Somebody got an awesome picture of it on one of those rare snowy days around Tokyo:

It may also help to search for 寺 (てら // temple), while you're at it. When speaking by the way, say お寺 (おてら). I recommend removing the お from your search because we also want temple names to come up, and -寺 (-じ) is often a suffix for temple names.

For example, everyone knows 金閣寺 (きんかくじ // Kinkaku-ji) in Kyoto:

↑ That's my mom and me, circa 2013. ^_^


So, yeah, please go exploring!

Who knows what amazing place you'll discover.

Maybe a shrine surrounded by trees...

...up the stone steps of what turns out to be a rather well-known park in Sapporo...

While on your Sapporo-parks adventure, you might also come across a lesser-known shrine:

This photo (which, sadly, I didn't take) is of the shrine just to the south of 中島公園 (なかじまこうえん // Nakajima Park), which was right across the street from our monthly rental in Sapporo... back in 2015!

The shrines that you find on your walk might not be breathtaking, as only a select few are. But I happen to quite like the little ones, too.

I used to pass by this one almost every day when we were staying in Zoshiki in 2016:

Photo, again, is from Google.

Anyway, have fun finding new places. And please tell me about them when you do!


Useful Japanese


すみません、この近くに神社はありますか?
すみません、 この ちかく に じんじゃ は あります か?
Excuse me, are there any shrines near here?
Literally: “excuse me, + this + nearby + に + shrine + は + there is + か?”


観光地はあんまり好きじゃないです。
かんこうち は あんまり すき じゃない です。
I don’t really like touristy areas.
Literally: “tourist spot + は + not very + liked + isn’t + です.”

散歩しながら現地の人たちの生活をのぞき見するのが好きです。
さんぽ しながら げんち の ひと たち の せいかつ を のぞきみ する の が すき です。
I like to go for walks, looking at how the local people live.
Literally: “going for a walk + while doing + local area + の + people + の + living / life + を + peeking at + do + の + が + liked + です.”
Note: This is me describing what I like to do when I travel somewhere. ^_^

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