Retrospective: A small mountain pass near Kamakura

Time for another retrospective post!

The last few times I have visited the area around Kamakura, I have had the fun of hiking the mountain passes, or kiridoshi. Before there were highways, trains and tunnels, these passes were how you got from one town/ valley to the next. Usually they had at least one temple or shrine at either end or in the middle. The climb can be steep, but there are always well-worn steps carved into the rocks, or wood and dirt steps set into the sides of the hill paths. Most of the towns and cities that they join maintain them as hiking paths for their citizens; it is a common sight to run into people walking their dogs, or just walking on a day off and enjoying the exercise.

Kamakura has at least seven famous passes into (and out) of it. I think I have managed to hike at least 5 of them including a spectacular one that has a  short tunnel carved into the rock face of a hill, and is fenced off as dangerous. Guess how many folks navigate around these fences...

The really odd thing about these passes is how many of them end up (or start off depending on your route) at the end of a residential street. Sure, there will be a park or a temple at some end but surprisingly enough, plenty of them also have paths that just come out at the end of small boring everyday streets. It must be great being a kid if you live close by.

Or this can backfire: Another pass one town over has one of its trails end right above a high school, with at least 500 meters of 60 degree angle stairs descending to the sports field. P.E. classes must be some unique form of hell at that school.

The Monkey Garden shrine pass (I think it is officially called the Nagoshi or Nagoe Pass) between Zushi and Kamakura is quite tame in comparison.

Head west down one of the main roads towards Kamakura and you will end up at the nondescript gate for the Monkey Garden Shrine. From there it is an uphill climb, past houses on the grounds, past the cemetery, (off to the side of it is a garden plot area that makes up the modern successor to the "monkey garden", where monkeys were supposed to help the shrine priests grow their food) past the dug out sandstone chambers in the hill, up to where the path divides. To the right a trail continues along the ridges of the hills, eventually ending at a second pass into Kamakura and shortly thereafter, near the eighth, intra-Kamakura Shakadō Pass. But the direct, historic path is to the left, past the back wall of the ridiculously large bubble-economy-era chateau property (rumored to have a 3-car elevator to get to it from the road way below) and then along a short trail into Kamakura, If you look carefully at the Google Maps covering the area most of the path is marked out, at least the part that detours past the samurai tombs and ends in the hills above Kotsubo. Strangely enough however, the other path into Kamakura is not yet Google-mapped.


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There is a historic marker where one of the leading lights of Japanese Buddhism passed by some 800 years ago. if you turn leftward shortly after (at the handy way-sign) you will be heading along the more popular route and soon pass a gated monument to the souls of those who died while using the pass, and a smaller monument for the souls of the animals that perished on the journey. It seems to be always guarded by cats.

A bit further is the fenced-off and gated "Samurai Tombs" area, which used to be overgrown, but recently has been cleaned up. Unfortunately it is only open a few weekends of the year. There was too much mucking about with the artifacts by jerks, so now access to it is restricted.

If you keep going along the path you would end up at the end of a residential street in the little fishing village between Zushi and Kamakura. Because it goes through an area with tight rock formations, this route is what is usually considered to be the main "Nagoshi/ Nagoe Pass", except that it doesn't really get you into Kamakura!

Backtracking and continuing westward will get you right into Kamakura. This is the part of the trip that is missing from Google Maps. No worries; the distances if you ignore the inclines and descents are in the range of long city blocks. Even in January, the last leg of the hike is through a nicely forested section until you emerge along a narrow path right up against the retaining walls holding back the hillside over the main JR train line tunnel.

This is the best part of the trip for me: the little neighborhood high in the cleft of the hill may have to put up with train noise for 16 hours a day, but at least there is no diesel smoke (the trains are electric) and the hillside forms a pocket micro-climate that must be slightly warmer than the rest of town, because every house seems to have a garden and a citrus tree.

Remember when you look at the photos: this is January! A bit of winter scruffy-ness with the foliage is unavoidable.

As you descend to track-level and navigate the rail crossing, you can see a further garden plot right between the two train lines!  If you blink when you are on the train coming out of the tunnel, you will miss it. Before the crossing you can catch a glimpse of a humongous cactus that someone has as their back yard "tree".

From then on, it is a 20 minute walk to the center of town and the main train station unless you take one of the back streets and stop at every temple and shrine along the way. This is historic Kamakura, so of course, there is at least one every block: shrines are generally free to explore, temples generally charge a small admission fee.

Here is the Flickr slide show of the whole hike, January 28, 2014:



https://www.flickr.com//photos/58896081@N04/sets/72157650041129096/show/with/16003829098/