Nishiarai Daishi is a grand Buddhist temple with all the trimmings—a great place to see all the holiday celebrations, but especially fabulous in February when the plum blossoms burst forth, in April when its renowned peony garden comes into bloom, and in late April to early May when its giant wisteria unfurls its meter-long purpleness.
Nishiarai Daishi’s peony garden is known far and wide for its dinner plate-sized blooms, but its stunning wisteria rivals the big boys at the Ashikaga Flower Park and it also boasts a shortcut to enlightenment, a healing figure of Kobo Daishi, a lovely koi pond, and my favorite attraction: the wart shrine.
This shrine is said to cure warts if you make an offering, throw some salt onto the saintly figure, then rub a little of that sacred salt on the afflicted spot…
and this well-worn figure of the temple’s founding saint Kobo Daishi is said to heal anyone who makes an offering, ladles water over his head (real or figuratively), and rubs the offending body part with one of the scrub brushes in the basin below.
But it’s these 88 Jizo figures that are a shortcut to enlightenment. Parading around these 88 figures is said to confer the same spiritual benefit as making the trek to all 88 temples on the venerable Shikoku pilgrimage circuit.
If you’re tired after that spiritual journey, there’s a nice little garden with a stone bridge and koi pond that’s especially cool and relaxing when it’s hot outside…
but who am I kidding? Let’s not pretend it’s not the flowers everyone comes here to see! Starting in
February
the many varieties of red, pink and white plum blossoms begin to pop…
along with some magnificent early-blooming cherries…
Together they put on a show that’s pretty rare…
because they’re so seldom planted so close together
April
is when the god of peonies shows due gratitude for being carried around in this gilded o-mikoshi…
by whipping up a riot of color in the temple’s peony garden.
The peonies as big as dinner plates bloom from mid to late April, and they’re so special…
each plant gets its own red parasol, to shade it from the sun.
The world-class wisteria begins to bloom in late April to early
May
but check this out: its very magnificence is a problem! There’s no way to actually capture just how HUGE this purple monster is…
It’s long! Too long to fit in one shot because you can’t get far enough away…
And it’s wide!
The streamers of purple trail nearly a meter long at their peak…
And when you walk inside, it’s like World Of Purple.
The reward on the other side is a lovely cool koi pond to sit beside!
An added bonus (as if we need one!) these giant koi nobori carp flags are put out for Childrens’ Day at the same time as the wisteria, from mid-April to May 5th.
Even the minor inari fox shrines dotted around the grounds are charming!
Nishiarai Daishi
Open: Every day
Hours: 9:00 – 16:30
Admission: Free
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And here are the other places I take my friends when they come to town
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Jonelle Patrick writes novels set in Japan, produces the monthly e-magazine Japanagram, and blogs at Only In Japan and The Tokyo Guide I Wish I’d Had
Jonelle Patrick writes about Japan 