Much less known than its Arashiyama cousin, the bamboo road of Nishikyo is an interesting place to visit if you want to avoid the crowds (and don't want to wake up at 5am). The Nishi-kyo district of Kyoto contains the Oharano valley (not to be confused with Ohara in the north!), and this is the heard of everything bamboo in Kyoto. You will find many farms and bamboo plantations (a.k.a. 'forests') here. One nice place to visit is the hill separating Oharano from the main Kyoto plain, for it contains a road with nicely trimmed bamboo fences and well maintained plantations. A small park/museum is also in the area, on the west foot of the hill.
Visiting Oharano just for the bamboo would be a bit of a pain though, because there is close to no buses here, and certainly no trains. Cycling or biking is your best bet, but if you don't mind a long walk it's doable too: the first couple of times I visited the area I walked to Yoshimine-dera from the nearest train station. Which is pretty far. But there's a few temples to see along the way, such as Shobo-ji, Shojo-ji or Komyo-ji, so it's not that bad... Recommended for: Access: Nearby: Kōmyō-ji 光明寺 (680m) External links: Website, Kyoto Navi, Satellite view, Map Keywords: Japan, 日本, Japon, Kyoto, 京都, Nishikyo, Takenomichi, 竹の径, bamboo road Statistics: visited on 3 occasions, id 377, 10 photos (4 extra photos can be found in the archive). |
