It is well known that most visitors to Japan follow a well-worn line from Tokyo to Kyoto and Osaka. But why not travel in the opposite direction to discover places spared from overtourism? I spent three days in the Tōhoku region, visiting three sacred sites: Mount Haguro, Zuigan-ji, and Chūson-ji.
Invited by Art & Space, a company that organizes cultural tours of exceptional historical sites, I had the opportunity to discover the richness of three prefectures, which abound with historical and natural splendors that I would like to introduce here.
Mount Haguro: learning to begin again
I left Tokyo on an early Shinkansen, and by early afternoon I stood at Zuishinmon, the gate that marks the entrance to Mount Haguro, one of the Three Sacred Mountains of Dewa in Yamagata Prefecture. Beyond it, a long stone staircase descends toward a stream before climbing again through a corridor of ancient cedars.
Led by a yamabushi, a practitioner of the mountain-ascetic tradition of Shugendō, I made my way forward slowly. The stones are uneven, and the cedars swallow sound. The purpose of this trek is, in a sense, to become one with nature, to allow oneself to be absorbed by the mountain. In Shugendō, the body must live the idea. Haguro is associated with rebirth, and the walk felt like a gentle shedding of the city I had left that morning. Halfway up, the five-storied pagoda appeared among the trees, unpainted and radiating serenity, a National Treasure that seems less like a man-made structure and more like something that had grown naturally from the earth.
After a long ascent of over 2,000 steps, enough to leave one feeling quite famished, I reached the Saikan, a former lodging for yamabushi. There, I was served shōjin ryōri, a traditional Buddhist mountain cuisine consisting of wild plants, bamboo shoots, and preserved ingredients, prepared with an economy that is as much ethical as culinary. The meal was good, and, above all, incredibly wholesome, with every ingredient sourced from the mountain itself.
At the summit, after a Shinto prayer ceremony at the Sanjingosaiden, the cello of Ayano Kamimura rose inside the great thatched hall. Music met the rustle of the forest, and the two seemed to answer each other.
As night fell, I made my way down to Tendō Onsen and its hot-spring waters, where I spent the night at Hohoemi-no-Yado Takinoyu, a ryokan whose warm hospitality felt like a gentle landing after the mountain. My room, a Japanese-Western suite, opened onto a private rooftop terrace and a panoramic open-air bath facing Mount Maizuru. Sinking into the water with the day's stone steps still in my legs, I could think of no better counterpoint to the austerity of the climb.
Matsushima and Zuigan-ji: the discipline of attention
The next morning, I crossed to the coast. Matsushima is celebrated as one of Japan's classic views, and a private cruise among its pine-crowned islands showed why. But it was long a place of prayer for the dead before it became a place of beauty, and in the shifting light and drifting mist, I could sense that older meaning.
At Zuigan-ji, a Zen temple of the Rinzai school, the main hall rebuilt by the warlord Date Masamune in the early seventeenth century opens onto gilded sliding-door paintings of pines, plum blossoms and birds. A monk guided me through the halls, and later led me in zazen. Adopting the proper posture (sitting cross-legged with a perfectly straight back) is no simple task. Even more challenging, however, is the discipline of controlling one’s breath and thoughts, the patient art of returning when the mind wanders.
Then came the cello recital. In the absolute stillness of the temple, each note slowly dissolved into the space around us. In this setting, ordinarily closed to the public, yet a place where music is deeply cherished, I felt the raw power of an art form elevated to the level of spirituality.
A private dinner within the temple closed the day, after which I traveled by car to the Century Hotel.
Hiraizumi and Chūson-ji: a vision of peace
On the last day, I travelled north to Hiraizumi in Iwate Prefecture. Before visiting the temple, I spent a lively late morning making mochi, a staple of the local table, and sampling sake at a small brewery, followed by a lunch of the freshly pounded rice cakes.
Chūson-ji, now part of a UNESCO World Heritage site, owes its grandeur to Fujiwara no Kiyohira, who lost much of his family in the wars that tore the region apart in the eleventh century. His response was not a monument to victory but an attempt to build a Buddhist Pure Land on earth, one that would honour all the dead, friend and foe alike.
A monk walked me along the tree-lined approach and into the Konjikidō, the Golden Hall completed in 1124, its lacquer, mother-of-pearl and gold gleaming in the half-light. It is the only building to survive from Kiyohira's original campaign, and it feels like a promise that has outlasted nine centuries.
That evening, in the main hall, before the Buddha, a concert featuring Ryutaro Suzuki on piano and Ayano Kamimura on cello served as an offering made not only to the audience, but to the deities, to the dead and to the land itself. Seated among other travellers, I was left spellbound, moved by a beauty rarely attained, a harmony born from the fusion of classical music and a sacred setting, a blend of art and space.
Why go?
If you are planning a journey to Japan, consider leaving room for the north. The Shinkansen will take you from Tokyo to Sendai or Ichinoseki in under three hours, and from there, the mountains, the sea and the temples are waiting.
What struck me most was how unforced it all was. There were no queues, no crowds jostling for photographs, only people for whom these traditions remain alive. Tohoku asks for a little more effort than the Golden Route, but it rewards that effort with something increasingly rare: space, time, tranquility, and beauty.
