My Japan Trip - Experiencing The Zen Kamakura

Hello there! It's my 4th post in the new World Map Pin community! Trying to do the tag as well! If you haven't read about them, please take a look at this link.

As background, I have done a few overseas trips last year, as some of my friends here would know, and I have been wanting to share some of the interesting places that I have visited. However, life has been busy and I have been procrastinating penning these entries and recently, I revisited this target of mine and finally broke the inertia!

One of my memorable trips in 2023 was to Tokyo, Japan, and during that trip, I did quite a few day trips to nearby cities and towns. Earlier this year, I wrote about visiting the peaceful Karuizawa, the scenic Atami, and the nature in Nikko. We continue with our trip and this time it's to the zen Kamakura!

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Kamakura is conveniently accessible by train from Tokyo and we reached there about 11am in the morning.

Our first destination was Tsurugaoka Hachimangu, which is one of the popular shrines in the area. It was a short walk from the train station, and thankfully, the path was semi sheltered by trees from both sides so the heat was still bearable.

Finally we reached Tsurugaoka Hachimangu! More steps to climb and here's another view from the top!

As I learnt from my earlier post, these are sake barrels! Thumbs up for the neat arrangement! Hehe! :)

Next, we continued to made our way by foot to Komachi Street, where there were eateries, dessert kiosks, and many shops! We had some matcha desserts (yay! my favourite!) and it's interesting that they have different intensities of matcha ice cream as well. Being a matcha lover, I went for the max Level 6! And it tasted so good!

Then we made our way to the main attraction in Kamakura, Kotoku-in! It was a few train stations away and required a little walk too! Kotoku-in is a Buddhist temple and upon entering it, what greeted us was a big statue of the Buddha. The surroundings were quiet and it felt very tranquil and peaceful. I stood in the area, took some photos, and admired this magnificent sight. I must say, the sight alone made my trip to Kamakura worth it!

We still had some time in the afternoon, and we took the train for another a few stops further down to Inamuragasaki to experience the local onsen. We were talking to some locals in Kamakura and they said we were lucky that day because the skies were very clear and we would be able to see Mount Fuji from Inamuragasaki! And indeed we saw it, both on the streets and in the onsen too! This was my best picture below - can you spot Mount Fuji? Hehe!

With that, that's all for my sharing for Kamakura. It's a little short day trip but I definitely experienced the zen-ness of the place which was very therapeutic for city dwellers like me. Sometimes it's nice to enjoy a slower pace of life and literally live life as it should be! Let me know in the comments if you have been to Kamakura, and what are your thoughts about this place? Stay tuned to find out where I will be travelling to next!

Finally, thanks for reading my post in the community under World Map Pin! More to come I promise! :)

P.S. I have also tried to document my posts in one table so it's easy to reference too!

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