Sacred spaces magnify Japan's wonder. Here are Kyoto's best.

When it comes to Japan, "temple" is a small word with a big footprint.

As a Westerner, I associate "temple" with a single building, like a church. Plan your Japanese sightseeing schedule on that basis and you're going to fall behind quickly, because the temples that make it onto the "must see" lists are enormous complexes with an array of sights within them. And temples, though a useful category label, isn't quite correct, since many noteworthy religious sites are shrines. Simply: temples are Buddhist, shrines Shinto. The religions sit comfortably side-by-side, and most Japanese use both, choosing temple or shrine to fit the occasion. For a Westerner new to the country it can be hard to tell the difference, as the buildings and the practices going on within them look remarkably similar. Usually, but not always ... if you spot distinctive Tori gates, it's Shinto, while serene, cross-legged figures (who are not always Buddha) indicate Buddhism.

Whether shrine or temple, it's in these spaces that you're most likely to tap deep into Japanese tradition. In an extremely urban, modern country, this is where you'll find quiet spaces, a connection with nature, majestic architecture, eye-numbing beauty and peaceful spirituality. The most famous ones are jammed with tourists, but it's not hard to slide off the beaten track to find lesser-known examples that are almost empty. And for every historically or architecturally significant place, you'll stumble across a roadside shrine or small neighbourhood temple. They might not have the cultural heft of the big sites, but they're charming and photogenic in their own ways.

Both the shrines and temples we visited had consistent layouts, and seemed to have a broadly similar form of worship. There will be a gateway, then an approach path of some sort, then perhaps another gateway. The more impressive the complex, the more gateways you seem to pass through and the more highly-decorated they will be. At the point where you're entering holy ground there will be a water fountain spilling in to a trough with some wooden ladles. Visitors should use these to clean their hands and, once they've done that, pour water into their hand to sip, swirl and spit, thus purifying the mouth. The path now may lead direct to the main building, or there may be smaller shrines and temples along the way. Bigger temples have separate prayer halls, usually open-sided pavilions where people sit in quiet contemplation, or to copy sutras. Buddhist temples often include cemeteries, and both shrines and temples may have gardens. Really big places, similar to the grand monastic complexes of medieval Europe, may have storehouses, offices and housing for priests.

Large or small, they'll have some method of leaving prayers. These are often lines of wire or string onto which strips of paper or cloth are tied. You can buy amulets to leave on statues, wooden sticks or placards to write your prayers on and hang on boards, or candles similarly inscribed to burn in front of the appropriate deity.  (The wooden prayers are eventually burned to send the words heavenwards.)  Money is key here. The thing Western visitors will find most jarring about Japanese temples and shrines is their straightforward consumerism.

Every altar has a collection box in front of it; it's understood that every prayer before it should be accompanied by at least a 5 yen coin. There will usually be thick ropes hanging from bells here; you get to ring them upon donation. But that's just table stakes. Most lanes up to temples will feature huts manned by priests selling lucky charms and wooden plaques for your prayers. The bigger the plaque, the bigger the cost. Resembling souvenir stands, these are even in the main temple buildings themselves; encountering five to ten different places to buy prayers wouldn't be unusual in your average complex. People also buy and light sticks of incense that fog the air. And that's just the everyday stuff. One assumes there are much more expensive and private deals to procure the big bottles of sake or boxes of luxury food items on altars as offerings. (Since the gods are unlikely to consume those, I'm assuming the priests tuck in after they've been on display for an appropriate time?)

At really busy temples like Tokyo's Senso-Ji or Kyoto's Fushimi Inari, your mind reels imagining the amount of cash that must be flowing through the place. (Interestingly, these two most commercial temples were also unique in their free access. You'll usually pay between £3 and £6 to tour these sites.) One assumes that hard-line Protestants must reel in horrified shock, endlessly running the story of Jesus throwing the moneylenders out of the temple through their brains. As a Roman Catholic it didn't feel that strange, though maybe a bit extreme. When you grow up sliding a $5 bill under St. Anthony's statue for help finding lost property, or slipping an imploring note into the lap of Mater Admirabilis for help on your next French test, then tying a note to a string near an aproned cow, then rubbing the part of his anatomy that hurts on yourself to make your ache go away really isn't that odd.

I do wonder if Japanese religion ever had a Henry VIII figure, who tried to sweep some of that cash back into governmental coffers, or a Martin Luther type who bristled at the pay-to-pray relationship. But those are nuances not tackled in basic tourist material or the histories I've read. For tourism purposes, just embrace the fact that religion and commerce go hand in hand, and that the beautifully packaged lucky charms they sell at temples and shrines make lovely, inexpensive gifts to bring home. I wish I had bought more.

While everywhere in Japan bristles with temples and shrines, they're particularly abundant in Kyoto, where it's said there are more than 1,600. Looking at the map, I suspect you could walk much of the hilly perimeter of the city on sacred ground, just hopping from one complex to another. Many of these are the headquarters of different sects of Buddhism, while many shrines have something to do with deified personalities who once lived in the area. A sense of Roman Catholic familiarity rears its head again. Kyoto's sacred scene feels a lot like Rome, where every religious order has to show off with its own headquarters church, and every saint associated with the city needs his or her own place of worship.

I suspect I could have gone for weeks flitting from temple to shrine and back again, appreciating subtle differences and quirky characteristics. (There's a shinto shrine dedicated to a rabbit god, filled with hundreds of statues of the little critters. How did I miss that?) But if you're time-limited, or expect temple fatigue after the first few visits, which to choose in Kyoto? I recommend these.

KINKAKU-JI
This is the one no self-respecting tourist can visit Kyoto without ticking off his list. Consequently, it's also the one closest to being destroyed by crowds. The draw? Gold.

The Golden Pavilion at the centre of this complex is a three-story building, resembling the upper levels of a pagoda, sitting on a lake surrounded by a picturesque garden, snuggled into a wooded hillside. The walls of the top two levels are entirely covered with gold leaf, and a golden phoenix spreads its wings from the crest of the roof. A solid gold building may sound too blingy to be tasteful, but the classic lines and natural setting pull the overall effect from tacky to mystical. This is the kind of place people in fairy tales stumble upon to find bewitched princesses or all-powerful sorcerers.

It's hard to connect with that magical allure, however, when you're shoulder to shoulder with bus tours of the world, and every good viewing spot is full of people competing for the most outrageous selfie. In an attempt to cope with the masses, temple management has closed all side paths, forcing visitors along a single, circular path. Not only does this shoulder-to-shoulder packed route have all the charm of trudging to the office during rush hour, it offers no chance to slip to quieter corners to sit and appreciate the scene. The garden across the lake from the pavilion looks great, but you won't be getting into it. The one-way system brings you through some pretty woodland paths behind the temple, up a hill and round a lake with some monuments on an island before getting to a cluster of temple buildings where the full incense/bell ringing/lucky charms/wooden plaque system is in full swing.

Yes, Kinkaku-Ju is an impressive building in a gorgeous setting. But it's in a far corner of town, so challenging to get to, and the crowds make it hard work. You don't get to see any interiors. Besides the gold, there's nothing outstanding about the architecture. If you're not bothered by missing the one temple everyone will expect you to see, this is the one I'd skip.

FUSHIMI INARI TAISHA
This Shinto shrine to the god of business has the same crazy crowds. Maybe worse. Getting out of the subway station here rivals rush hour madness in London. But it's worth persevering, both for the quality of the art and architecture, and for the cultural observation. This is the place with the long corridors of red tori gates; they snake up wooded slopes to a lofty mountainside platform above the city. It's possibly the most photographed spot in Kyoto. You'll also hear it called the Fox Temple.

Shinto is closely associated with nature; mountains, streams and animals all have spirits that may be appealed to for help. In pretty much every other country's folklore, the fox is a bad guy: trickster, menace, chicken coop raider. For some reason lost in time, the Japanese fox, Inari, is a benign guardian. More dog than vermin, he's often pictured with the keys to the rice granary in his mouth. (You wouldn't trust an English fox with keys to anything.) He's also the spirit of rice and agriculture, and early-on was adopted by merchants as the patron of business. I will forever think of Fushimi Inari Taisha as the shrine of corporate sponsorship. All those tori gates that form the corridors, about 1,000, are actually funded by businesses seeking good fortune. I suspect the allure of the walk through the gates would be somewhat less compelling if you can read Japanese. "Eat at Yoshi's Noodle Shop", "Blessings On Hidate Motors" and "Seek Innovation at Yakata Data" have a good deal less majesty than rows of complex and unintelligible characters on red gates.

This is a sprawling complex, most crowded at its lowest, easily accessible levels. But even if you don't fancy climbing the mountain there's plenty to see here. Fox spotting is a joy. The ornamental gateway into the main temple courtyard has some spectacular life-sized archers on guard; they're statues, but so exquisitely painted you expect them to spring to life. The hall with the main altar has spectacular gold and white lanterns and stepped shelves lined with ceremonial sake. White robed priests in bulbous black hats bustle about, perform mysteries in front of altars and burn accumulated prayers. Business at the stalls selling prayer plaques, good luck charms and mini tori gates is brisk. As befits a shrine to business, there's a whole street of gift shops off to one side. If you want to take home a fox statue, tori gate or even a small home shrine, they're all for sale. A lane leading diagonally from the gift shops is lined with street food vendors and small restaurants. We got our timings wrong; schedule your visit to Fushimi Inari Taisha to finish at lunch or dinner.

The main appeal, however, is those corridors of tori gates. Even traversing them with packs of other tourists, they're magical. The further and higher you go, the more crowds melt away. We only did the first half of the circuit and found pleasant pockets of quiet; I suspect there are more moments of peace, and even better photo opps, for those who trek all the way to the top. The climbing isn't particularly hard, but if you're coping with Japan's grueling humidity, as we were, you'll probably find the lower slopes enough of an experience.

KODAI-JI

An excellent example of how, the moment you drop out of the acknowledged Top 10 sites, you're off the beaten track. Kodai-Ji is hugely significant from a historical perspective, holding the grave and shrine of the second of Japan's three unifiers, Toyotomi Hideyoshi, and his wife. She was responsible for creating the place after his death, at which point she had become a Buddhist nun. The statue of her in their tomb, one assumes, shows her before religious austerity.

This is another complex that drifts up a mountain. There are two main temple buildings at base level (which you've already climbed a steep processional avenue of stairs to reach), the Toyotomi tomb half way up, and another shrine at the very top, with steps through an atmospheric bamboo grove linking them. If you don't have time for the more famous, and famously crowded, Arashiyama bamboo grove, you'll get a similar feeling here and will probably be almost alone. Signs suggest you might have to share your space with some monkeys, but one assumes that on a day as hot and humid as the one that hosted our explorations, any creature sporting a fur coat was hiding somewhere cool and dark. The complex also holds a Buddhist cemetery, a museum of temple treasures we didn't have time to check out, several ceremonial tea houses and a handful of adjunct shrines, including one featuring the magic cow mentioned above.

This is also one of those temples to which gardens are central. On one side of the complex at base level there's an exquisite garden built around a lake, crossed by a remarkably picturesque covered bridge. Unlike Kinkaku-Ji, you can walk all over here and cross the bridge without restriction. There's no walking in the garden on the other side of the big, open-sided prayer and music hall, however, where you'll find one of the country's more famous Zen gravel gardens. Its regularly raked into different designs, all intended for contemplation and the generation of deep thoughts. Interesting, though I like my gardens with plants.

The buildings here are particularly lavish, both inside and out. The Toyotomi shrine is the central jewel, currently undergoing a restoration that's bringing its rich colours back to peak brightness. Life-sized statues of the unifier and his wife sit in a black and gold lacquered stage set inside, while gold and bright primary colours decorate the exterior eaves and cross-timber ends. There's an extraordinary set of paintings of dancing maidens in one prayer hall, and a dramatic ceiling of clouds and dragons in another. It's all fitting for the man who was also the most culturally sensitive of the three unifiers.

Just south of Kodai-Ji ... you'll exit onto it ... is a broad car and bus park lined with snack bars and touristy shops. Cross this and descend the stairs and you'll find yourself at the top of Nineizaka, the favourite shopping street I mentioned in  my last post on Gion. But linger a bit for two other sights before you do. One is obvious: an enormous Buddha sitting against the hillside to the east. You'll already have spotted his head looming above the trees as you hiked down from Kodai-Ji's summit. Here you can get the full view, though you'll have to pay another admission fee to go into the separate temple housing him. Seek out a free audience with the robot kannon instead. The android version of the Buddhist deity of mercy preaches in both English and Japanese. Remarkably human skin on face, neck and hands contrast with an obviously cyborg body. His creators selected words, voice and facial expression to convey a benign, loving sense of calm. I wouldn't leave Kyoto without a visit.


SANJUSANGEN-DO
Speaking of kannon, if one robot incarnation isn't enough for you, you can find 1,000 medieval ones at Sangusangen-do temple. These are arguably far creepier, with their 42 insect-like arms each and small secondary heads sprouting from around their crowns. Five hundred stand on either side of an enormous Buddha, in long rows on ten stepped platforms, filling a wooden hall that stretches for 120 metres. At the front, overlooking the aisle on which worshippers processes the length of the hall, are rather horrifying larger-than-life guardian figures protecting the kannon. (And, presumably, enforcing the "no photos" rule inside the sacred space.)

This temple is one of the oldest in Kyoto, founded in 1164, and the immense wooden hall has a feeling of extreme antiquity. The massed ranks of kannon are an extraordinary sight, unlike anything I've witnessed elsewhere. If you're looking for unique or deeply atmospheric, this is probably Kyoto's star sight.

It's also one of the few major temples that doesn't take much physical effort to explore, as it's all on the flat. The extraordinary length of the main hall is almost as impressive from the outside as in. (En route back to the UK, it occurred to me that the first time humans regularly built single spaces this long was train and airport terminals; nearly 1,000 years after Sanjusangen-do's establishment.) The length was so unique in Japan that this became a place for archery competitions. Were you strong enough to shoot the length of the hall? The major festival here, and the gift shop, is still based around the bow.

SAIHO-JI (KOKEDERA)
This temple takes effort to reach, space must be reserved months in advance and it's far better known for its garden (which I'll write about in my next story) than for its buildings. All that said, it was the most spiritual encounter we had in any temple or shrine in Japan, with the religious bit almost being more memorable than the justly-famous moss garden. It's worth the effort for the one-of-a-kind experience.

You'll apply to visit the garden: find instructions here, applications open two months before your requested date and spaces regularly sell out. Before you get into the gardens, however, you must attend and participate in the regular ceremony of Buddhist worship here. You'll arrive, walk to the entry building, present your ticket, remove your shoes and pay for entry. At the set time, temple attendants will lead you around the broad, covered verandas and into the main prayer hall, where rows of low desks .... to Western eyes more like the lap trays off which you eat sofa-based dinners  ... await. There are a few tables on the veranda for the less agile, but you must be at the front of the group to grab one. Even if you're as creaky and inflexible as me, however, it's worth heading into the hall and getting onto the floor. It's far more atmospheric.

A temple attendant will launch a speech in Japanese that you won't understand, but an English fact sheet, observation and common sense will fill in the gaps. One form of Buddhist worship is copying sutras; the quiet, brain-intense act of repeating someone else's complex kanji characters becomes a contemplative spiritual exercise. In addition to your rosewood lap desk there's a dark stone inkwell with a bamboo handled brush and a puddle of black ink waiting for you. You might be hundreds of years in the past. It's hard to resist the temptation to panic when you see the length and complexity of the sutra, but they make it easy for you by passing out papers with the whole thing printed in a ghostly light grey. You just have to trace over what's already there with your brush. The man in charge (who might have been a priest, but was in normal clothes) launched us with something that had the cadence of a prayer, though we understood none of it, then came pleasant communal silence as about 100 people dipped their brushes and got to work. It was immensely soothing. Had they sold the equivalent of a colouring book to continue the practice at home, I would have bought it.

When you finish your sutra, you write your own personal prayer to one side and take it up to the main altar to present to the Buddha. With a 5 yen coin, naturally. At some point later, the labours and wishes of all those visitors will be burned, ascending to heaven as smoke. Saiho-Ji conjured a magical window of peace and serenity into a trip that was otherwise generally crowded and frenetic.

In a country as densely populated and urban as Japan, crowded and frenetic are inevitable. Temples provide a respite. So do gardens. By the end of the trip I came to see the latter not in the English way, as the magical combination of nature, horticulture and art, but as an intellectual pause in a busy world, designed to relieve pressure. More on that, and the best gardens in and around Kyoto, in my next entry.