Ryuhoji

 Up under the eaves of the pagoda I notice a colorful but unidentifiable animal of some sort.

 Another Buddhist statue with fresh flowers but again I do not know who it represents.

 This is the little Shinto shrine that is next to the main hall.  The statues of two foxes in front of the torii, two in this case, plus the fact that the torii are red implies that this is one of the Inari Shrines. Inari is the Shinto god (kami) of fertility, rice, agriculture, foxes, industry, and worldly success. Apparently about one third of the shrines in Japan are dedicated to Inari.

 Some one has place a container of rice wine, sake, between the legs of this fox.

 This is the beginning of a small construction project. I know this because of the bamboo poles at the four corners of the space and right in the middle (very hard to see) a shorter pole with folded white paper hanging from it. This shows that the Shinto ceremony to bless the site has been completed. This was done even though this is a Buddhist temple.

This is a strong storage house where the temple keeps it valuables, mostly art work, I would imagine. This storage buildings have thick walls, strong windows and doors, and would be very hard to break into without making a huge amount of noise for a long time.

Ryuhoji

 If you remember, we were escorting a guest, the father of an Australian friend, and he had little experience in Japan. We stopped here in front of the bell tower and were talking about Buddhism and temples.  The idea of Shinto shrines came up since we had just visited one. We told him that shrines and temples were often collocated. He found this a bit surprising, Christianity's relationship to other religions. We suggested that he turn around and look at the red objects in the distance.

 A closer look revealed, a Shinto shrine on the raised area next to the main hall of the temple.

 This is the entrance to the main hall.

 This is a view of the pagoda from the back.

 You can see that the structure of the roof is similar to that of most temples.

We walked toward the Shinto shrine to let our guest get a better look at it, and of course, to see if for ourselves. When we got close enough, we saw a crow having lunch on the offering of rice that had been placed in front of the shrine, probably by the Buddhist priests who run the temple.

Ryuhoji

 We walked into the grounds, passed the pagoda and saw the fountain where you are supposed to purify yourself before going further.

 As usual the water came out of the mouth of a dragon.

 It was a very ferocious looking dragon, so I was sure that the water would be pure.

 After washing our hands, we proceeded deeper into the grounds and found this Buddha, or maybe a Bodhisattva. There was an offering of an orange and some water. Someone had placed a red cloth hat and bib on the statue but it had long since been bleached almost white by the sun.

 This round stone statue was quite impressive. The plaque says "pile of flowers" or something like that. As often happens I have no idea what it refers to.

Just before arriving at what appeared to be the main building there was another group of stonework. I know that the objects that the Buddha/Bodhisattva carries tell us who he is but I do not know much of the symbolism.

Dou'unji Temple

 This ornate stone lantern stands in front of the now empty field where the main building used to stand. The building on the hill is a newish meditation hall. It was built before the earthquakes and seems to have survived.

 This stone lantern looks like a moss covered mushroom.

 Here we have a guardian lion. Notice the insides of the mouth and nose are red as are its claws.

 This is the small altar that the lion is guarding.

 I started home and as I passed near the graveyard I noticed that someone had left tea and flowers at this small stele.

Also this statue has been give a new red bib.

Yamadera

 We went back to the station and looked back at Yamadera on the mountain across the valley. I know that at first I called it a hill, but after climbing it, I think it deserves the grander title of mountain.

 We found that we had about 50 minutes until the next train, so we decided to visit the Basho museum. It was, naturally, up a hill. As we approached the top, this building came into view.

 Once we reached the top of the hill, we could see the grounds of the museum. I was surprised at the number of separate buildings.

 The roadway was lined with stelae that contained haiku. I had no idea who the authors were, but it appeared that they were not famous.

 We saw one building that looked old, or at least, constructed in the old traditional style.

Inside there was a gift shop and a meeting room for haiku sessions, among other things.

Yamadera

 We passed the final building, which although outside the temple was still part of the complex.

 Just beyond that building we came to a large cave that had a man-made support on the left side. The white objects are a row of rocks and beyond them the cave continues into the mountainside. This was (is?9 probably used as a meditation site.

 We turned into the sun and toward the river and the bridge back into the small town.

 From the bridge we could see the bridge that carries the train that will eventually take us back to Sendai. The only problem was that there is only one train an hour. But before worrying about that we decided to find someplace to eat.

We decided on this restaurant. We sat in the right hand corner nearest the large boulder. We had a great view of the river.

Yamadera

 Another narrow place in the path, This one is marked with a stone latern.

 This is an incense burner. Again someone has left slats with names written on them as requests for favors. Although it is not part of the ultimate levels of Buddhism, many lay members make wishes at the altars and other special places.

 Back down the mountain we turned right and walk along a path that we had not been on earlier. There were workmen taking a break in the shade of the gate. You can see them on the left of the pillars. They told us that this work was just normal periodic repairs and had nothing to do with the tremors.

 Inside the gate I found this rather nice statue, probably of a Bodhisattva. By the way a Bodhisattva is someone who has almost reach enlightenment but who stays connected with society in order to assist others toward that goal.

 Passed the statue, we found another temple. This one had a very interesting bell tower(?) outside. It was the smallest temple bell that I have ever seen.

Here is the same entrance from the other side.

Yamadera

 This hole in the rock face (above the greenest leaves) was apparently a place for meditation. Throughout Japan many temples have such holes where a monk could go and meditate for long periods, often days, without having to contact other humans.

 This stone lamp post seems to be wearing a stone straw hat.

 This is a tree trunk that is completely covered with pieces of bamboo, apparently for protection against the snow which is very deep here every winter.

 This is the view down through the branches to the next level. If you look carefully, you can see at least three or four people.

 Here the stairs narrowed to not much more than the width of two shoes as the path passed between to large boulders.

This is a second trail that comes down from somewhere above. The next time I visit Yamadera I will follow this path just to see where it goes.

Yamadera

 When not climbing long flights of stairs, the walk was very pleasant.

 This large boulder has been hollowed out and behind the door there is a small wooden building containing a statue.

 This building was old and in need of some repairs. There was a meditation room and altar off to the left but a bunch of noisy people, including one man who was talking with this office about work in a very load voice, arrived so we left before they broke the mood.

 Starting back down the mountain, we could see across the valley.

 As we went down each level, the mountains on the other side of the valley seemed to grow taller.

One of the administrative buildings had this huge set of pray beads. You were supposed to grasp the beads with one hand and pull down on them while reciting some sort of short group of words. Each bead was almost as big as my fist.