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Ninety seconds on Otagi Nenbutsu-ji
As of October 2026, the temple opens from 9:00 to 16:00 on the days it is open. It shuts every Wednesday and Saturday, so a visit has to fall on one of the other five days of the week.
No, entry is ticketed. The temple charges an admission fee to every visitor aged 11 and over, while children aged 10 and under go in free of charge.
Kyoto Bus 94, bound for Kiyotaki, runs from the Nonomiya stop to Otagi Dera Mae in about 25 minutes. Nonomiya is a ten-minute walk west of JR Saga-Arashiyama Station. Walking the whole way takes about an hour, most of it uphill.
The simplest route is the JR train to Saga-Arashiyama Station, then a taxi from either side of the station. The taxi ride takes about five minutes, and drivers know the temple by name or by its Japanese characters, 愛宕念仏寺.
Forty to 45 minutes covers the statue slope and the small garden above it. Visitors who linger over individual faces can comfortably stay closer to an hour before heading back down.
It is, chiefly for the hillside of individually carved stone faces, a sight unlike the gardens and halls elsewhere in Arashiyama. The temple also draws far less traffic than the bamboo grove, and it sits at the head of the walk down through the old village.
One slope at the far end of Saga holds a crowd of carved stone faces, near enough to catch every grin, frown and odd prop, at the top of the long haul up from the bamboo.
About 1,200 stone rakan, disciples of the Buddha, stand in ranks across the hillside inside the gate. Some laugh, some sulk, and one seems to be shouting at the sky.
Look at what they hold. One grips a tennis racket, another what looks like a portable cassette player, and a third wears something close to a medieval helmet. Others simply look worried.
Moss has settled into the carved lines over three decades, so the figures look softer and stranger than when they were cut.
Ordinary people carved them in the 1980s, learning the craft under the chief priest, Kocho Nishimura. Each face is the work of whoever cut it, which is why the expressions range so far.
There are two fierce Nio guardians in the gate as you enter. Past them the path slopes uphill among the statues. Stop at each row to read the faces.
Above the slope, more stairs climb to a small garden with water features and torii gates.
Leave on foot. The temple marks the start of the Saga-no walk, and the road runs downhill through the Saga-Toriimoto preserved street, past wooden machiya with latticed windows, now shops and restaurants. Adashino Nenbutsu-ji, about ten minutes down, sits where the preserved street ends.
Downhill, the same road reaches Arashiyama Bamboo Grove in 35 to 40 minutes and goes on to Togetsukyo Bridge in the centre of Arashiyama.
If you plan to ride back instead of walking, photograph the return timetable at the stop when you get off the bus. The times on that board decide how long you can stay.
Taxis do not cruise for fares up at the temple. If you miss a bus, the nearest road where one might pass is about twenty minutes on foot, so settle the ride back before you start on the hillside.
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