Jikishi-an is located in a bamboo forest at the end of a short valley, north of Daikaku-ji (大覚寺). The temple was established in 1646, but the small thatched-roofed hermitage burned down and was rebuilt by volunteers in 1899.

The bamboo forest and the nice hermitage make a perfect destination of an afternoon stroll in the northern Arashiyama area. While bamboo forests have this exotic touch that make them very popular for foreigners, this one sees little "gaijin" traffic as the temple is away from the main tourist roads. There might be another reason too: bamboo forests are the preferred habitat for the beautiful and large golden orb weaver spider called "jorogumo" (nephila clavata). Visiting Jikishi-an in summer or autumn means you will have to watch your head for spiders if you're over 1.7m!

Jikishi-an is also a popular place for mizuko-jizo, these little stone statues that are placed by parents of stillborn (or aborted) children. It is also the last refuge for a... protected species of green frog "moriaogaeru" (森青蛙, モリアオガエル, literally: forest blue frog, but you know Japanese have difficulties making the difference between green and blue!)

The main hall of the temple has a collection of more than 5000 guest books going way back to 1965! You can browse them and see what people said on your birthday. Some statistical analysis would definitely show the rise in the number of foreigners visiting Japan: almost no English or French in 1976, but it's much more common today.

Keywords: jikishi-an, 直指庵, 祥鳳山直指庵, jishiki-an, お寺, temple, 卍, jishikian, hermitage, 寺院

Nearby: Daikaku-ji 大覚寺 (590m), Seiryo-ji 清涼寺 (1.1km)

Visited on 2 occasions, id: 437, 15 photos (2 extra photos can be found in the archive).