Japanese Holy Mountai, Mt.Owari-Fuji

Recently, I started to clime some mountains to take off my weight with my friend every weekend. And one of our favorite mountains is “Owari-Fuji”, which is the holy mountain in our area. So, this time I’ d like to introduce the mountain, because of the mountain is very unique.

At the beginning, I need to describe the mountain, how the mountain is unique. The mountain is owned by the Shinto shrine and they have a “Ishiage-Matsuri“, which is a festival to bring some so big stones to the mountain. This is the reason, there are a log of big stones along the mountain path.

Please check my pictures that I took when I clime the mountain!



This is the bottom of the mountain and the entrance of the mountain path. Could you feel something by this picture?




After start to clime, there are some big stones on both sides of the path, and some of the stones are so old.





Could you guess the size of the stones by the person? The stones are bigger than him. So, the stones were brought by many people from old times.




When I was at the middle of the mountain, the time I found the freestanding signboard, which describing the story of the mountain.
The story is…”Once upon a time, there was a nun who ate a meat of mermaid, and she already lived to be 800 years old by the meat. When the nun wanted to climb over the middle of mountain, her palm stuck on a rock and couldn’t separate it. Because, the part over half of the mountain was closed to women climbers. After making apology for the mountain god, her palm was separated.
At that night, she dreamed the god of the mountain and he gave an oracle bringing a lot of big stones to be higher that Mt. Hongu for her. This is the history of Ishiage-Matsuri”





Therefore, every big stones has same word “献石”, and the word means “Offering Stone”. The left stone and right stone have different words, right? Right stone is younger than left one, so the styles of the Chinese character are difference.









After middle, the atmosphere would be suitable for the holy mountain. The air also changed to be chilly.




And these stones amazed me. You know? The weight are so heavy, so I couldn’t guess how they brought to, because, some of the part of the path were too steep that they brought it to.




Could you see? There was a path at the center of the picture to go the top of the mountain. I climbed on the way by the recommendation of my friend for our exercise when I went up. After followed him, I got regret soon.




This picture is another path. In my opinion, this way is totally better than his recommendation. Don't you think so?





This is the top of the mountain! There is a Shinto Shrine! I found some so old big stones that had been brought before 150 years ago.

How do you think about this holy mountain? In my case, I really enjoyed to climb the mountain and to feel the atmospheres that was so nice to feel ancient Japanese nature. If you’ll visit Aichi province, please try to climb this mountain.

If you're interested in Inuyama, please check more!
Inuyama City in Aichi