A Brief Guide to Kurume

I must admit I had never heard of Kurume and knew nothing about it when I visited in the latter stages of my first walk around Kyushu, however, I ended up spending a bit of time there as a base for several legs of the pilgrimage.

It is located on the banks of the Chikugo River which runs through the large Tsukushi Plain of northern Kyushu. It was a castle town, important I believe as a crossroads of several major transportation routes through Kyushu.

There seems to be little of the old left standing. Kurume did get bombed a little at the end of the war, but most destruction has been at the hands of construction companies and developers. The top photo shows a view looking down on Kurume from Kora Shrine, a mountaintop shrine that has an old approach,.

Not sure what the store in the second photo was selling, but the frontage impressed me.The third picture is a Science Museum, and the 4th is an Art Museum that had a fine garden in its grounds.

Near the Science Museum was another park that included a small Chinese-style garden. Other notable gardens include the riverside one featuring plum trees at the monastery of Bairinji, and Henshoin, a modern creation to honour a samurai political hero.

There were several more shrines in the town, and plenty more temples, but probably the main tourist attraction is a little outside the town. The Giant Kannon statue, one of the biggest in the world, is at a branch of the Naritasan Temple.

Nakano Park Kurume

 

Nakano ark in Kurume, Fukuoka, is home to the Kurume City Aer Museum, the Shojiro Ishibashi Memorial Museum, and the main library.

The area behind the Art Museum has a large pond with bridges and koi.

A large section is landscaped as a traditional Japanese garden and includes a small waterfall.

When I visited in mid-winter it was the most enjoyable of the gardens in Kurume,...

Though at other times of the year I suspect the garden at Bairinji Temple, and the nearby Henshoin Garden would be more attractive.

Henshoin Garden

 

At one end of Teramachi in Kurume is a largish garden called Henshoin. Henshoin still exists , but the garden is a modern creation built adjacent to the temple.

It is a stroll^type garden with a large pond with a bridge. It was designed and built in the 1960's. It also ahs a small tea room which had been brought from Kyoto.

The garden was built to memorialize an Edo-Period samurai called Takayama Hikokuro whose grave is here.

He is said to have influenced Yoshida Shoin, one of the architects of the Meiji Restoration, and was considered an example of an imperial loyalist in the patriotic education of the 1930's. There is a famous statue of him at sanjo bridge in Kyoto.

In the dead of winter when I visited  the garden was not so colourful but I suspect it looks better in spring and autumn.

Kurume Temple Town

 

Like most of the former castle towns of the Edo Period, Kurume in Fukuoka is home to a street named Teramach.

Teramachi literally means "temple town" and is/was a district of Buddhist temples occupying adjacent plots of land, now a street with nothing but temples on either side.

The Lords of the domains would have family temples that were not usually in the Teramachi, and some older temples continued to occupy their original sites.

Some of the temples in Teramachi were newly founded, and some were moved from other locations. Most of the different sects are usually represented.

There is rarely any significant temples in teramachi, and as they are located in what are now modern cities,  they are often rebuilt in concrete.

However, they sometimes have nice, though small, grounds, so here are a few shots from Teramachi in Kurume.

The Way To Kora Taisha

 

While studying maps to set my route as I walked from Kurume Naritasan and the Giant Kannon back to Kurume where I was based for several days I noticed a large mountaintop shrine and so decided on a route that would take me to it.

I must admit that I had never heard of Kora Taisha before. Taisha means Grand Shrine and so it is and was an important shrine. In fact it was the Ichinomiya for the province.

It was a huge temple-shrine complex that while centered on the main buildings near the top of the mountain, had numerous shrines and temples scattered around the base and on the route up to the main shrine.

It is now possible to drive all the way up to Kora Taisha, but I chose to take the stairway that was the original route. I don't particularly enjoy climbing, but it is the only way to get to the top.

There are several small shrines at special trees and rocks on the way up. At its peak more than 1,000 people lived and worked within the shrine, and that included more than 300 Buddhist monks.

Almost all of the Buddhist temples, structures, pagodas, etc that once were here have all been removed, though a couple of gates still remain.

There are also numerous Torii on the way up. The large stone torii at the bottom of the mountain was built in the 17th century, though the other along the way up are not that old.

Next post I will show you around the main shrine, which is said to be one of the largest in Kyushu. I will also delve a little more into the Buddhist legacy.

For those who drive up there is just one Torii to walk through from the parking lot. Coming up the original stairway is I think about 1.5 kilometers.

Bairinji Gaien the Outer Temple Garden

 

The Gaien is the outer gardens of Bairinji Temple in Kurume. Mostly situated to the north of the temple along the bank of the Chikugo River.

In 1958 the temple gave it to the city asa public park. It is most famous for more than 500 Plum trees of about 30 different species, asa well as azaleas. I visited in late December so there wee no plum blossoms ready yet.

As the first photo shows, there was evidence of maple trees, and the last photo shows evidence of Gingko, so there must have been some nice autumn colors a month or so before.

Even without the seasonal displays, I found the gardens nice to visit.

The buildings inside the walls seem to be closed to the pub;ic, but there still remains some zen gardens in the outer garden.

A previous post with details of the temple and its history can be found here.

Bairinji Zen Temple

Bairinji

Situated on the bank of the Chikugo River in Kurume, Fukuoka, Bairinji is a long established temple of the Rinzai sect that I would call a monastery as many Buddhist monks, priests, and laypeople come here for training .

The temple originated in Fukuchiyama, northern Kyoto, and was named Zuiganji. It was moved to Kurume in the early 17th century by Toyoji Arima after he was given the Kurume Domain for his part in the battle of Sekigahara.

Zuiganji was where his father had been buried and the remains were also brought along so the temple could continue to be the family temple.

It was renamed Barinji after the posthumous name of his father. The cemetery contains the tombs of  the Arima famiy.

There seems to be some fine buildings, but the gates to most of them were closed. Some of the fates had some fine carvings. The temple is apparently home to many treasures..... but seems ,ostly closed to visitors.

However, the larger "outer" garden of the temple was made into a public park, and to this I return in the next post...

Buy tatami direct from Japan

A Long and Delightful Day 51 on the Kyushu Pilgrimage

 

It was still dark when I left my hotel in Kurume on 23rd December 2013, and took the first train out to the south to where I finished my walk yesterday. Dawn revealed a thick blanket of frost on the land as I approached the first pilgrimage temple of the day.

After the temple I start to walk back towards Kurume ad am greeted by these jolly fellows. Apparently a biker group collecting donations and toys to give to kids. Think they were impressed that I didnt have to wear a fake beard to look like Santa.

By lunchtime I had climbed up to a mountaintop shrine that had stupendous views down over Kurume and the whole Chikugo River valley. I would be walking avross and around that area for the newxt week.

Down into Kurume to explore and I discover a lot of small gardens....

Most surprising was a Chinese garden

However, the highlight of the day was a visit to something I could see not long after visiting the first temple, but which still took a couple of hours to reach...... The Kurume area is not a well known tourist destination, but I hope you will join me over the next week or two as I post photos of some of the surprising delights I found....