Mount Daimonjiyama Without the "dai"

What?
Daimonjiyama (大文字山) is a 466m high mountain to the northeast of Kyoto (京都). Its easy accessibility combined with the sweeping views over central Kyoto make it a popular hiking route for both locals as tourists alike. Famous tourist attractions at multiple trail heads also help its popularity; the philosopher’s path connects the Keage Incline (蹴上インクライン) with the Silver Pavillion (銀閣寺), but you might as well switch with a hike up Daimonjiyama: you start and end all the same.
Where?
Located in Kyoto, we started the hike from the Kyoto Subway Keage Station (蹴上駅). The trailhead is on the other side of the station, right next to the rather unkown Himukai Daijingu Shrine (日向大神宮). The hike ends right next to the Ginkakuji or Silver Pavillion, which is probably served by an array of buses, but none of which I’ll be able to tell you as the public bus system in Kyoto is still a huge mystery to me.
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Craft Tabby Inside Kyoto

I tend to hike alone or with people from around the same age. Today would be different though, as I’d be climbing up a mountain with people spanning 3 – or if you stretch it 4 – generations. A first for me, and not knowing everyone’s level of fitness, I opted for one of the easiest accessible hikes in Kyoto: the climb up to Daimonjiyama.
The literal translation of this mountain would be “the character dai (大 big) mountain”. It actually refers to a huge depiction of the character “dai” that is written on this mountain and occasionally is lit up so people in Kyoto looking towards the mountain can see it.

I had seen many pictures of this mountain when the big character “dai” on the mountain was lit up. The course we were about to take also figures in pretty much every book about hiking in Kansai that I’ve leafed through, with daylight pictures showing the spot where the fires would be lit to get the “dai” flaming. I’ve never seen much other pictures, so I kind of feared it might be a boring mountain apart from the top.

But anyway.

Yesterday the weather gods must have released every drop of liquid they had on them, but today a sunshine mark prevailed on every weather report I had checked. Great.
Let’s start.

The hike would start near the Keage Incline, famous for its cherry blossoms. The actual hanami season (cherry blossom viewing season) is well over its peak though, so there were no more visible throngs of visitors.
After looking around a bit for the start of the hike next to the Himukai Daijingu Shrine, I was pleasantly surprised to see there were still a few cherry blossoms left at the entrance of the trail. This would be the first and last cherry blossom tree we’d see though, but blooming local rhododendrons made for bright colors along the way up. These patches of purply pink beautifully contrasted with the lush spring green and the blue skies up above.
I was equally surprised by the path which was easy to tread, but still wilder than I expected for a hike so close to Kyoto’s center. No monocultural forest either: this was a pretty neat route through a genuine and wildly varied forest.
With a small shrine along a cave and waterfall where ‘do not naked Saint buddha’ or something similar was worshipped, this hike was shaping up to be a real success.

Rather sooner than later we reached a ridge where we had a few great views of Kyoto, the blue skies and what I thought must have been Uji. Another 15 minutes and we’d reach the top.
Everything going great.

A wild path, steep at some places.

A detail along the way.

Different generations strolling along.

Rhododendrons complementing green and blue.

What happened on the top is still a mystery to me.
We were walking in shirts underneath a clear sky just a few minutes ago, and just when we wanted to enjoy a well earned onigiri at the top with a gorgeous backdrop of Kyoto, a mass of grey clouds enveloped the whole city – including Daimonjiyama – and spit out whatever the weather gods had left over from yesterday. It wasn’t a drizzle either so we quickly rounded up our gear and continued down the mountain.

Now that wouldn’t have been so bad. But in our hurry to continue the hike, we skipped that picture spot in every hiking book… the spot where they would lit the “dai” character. I only realized this halfway down when the weather had cleared up again…
While no one in the group was dead tired, I also saw reluctance to go back up again, so I swallowed my deception at my own stupid mistake and we continued down the rocky path towards the Silver pavilion.
We briefly strolled through this temple which was oddly bereft of huge crowds and “enjoyed” some mitarashi dango.

Whatever the case, apart from that blob of grey that quite spoiled the experience at the top and made me forget the most unique characteristic of the mountain, I was pleasantly surprised by the hike up Daimonjiyama.
There are a myriad of trails here, so maybe I’ll come back, hike up in the opposite direction and experience the “dai” in Daimonjiyama another time.