Upon arrival in Kyoto, we aimed straight for our top sight here and spent the whole afternoon at Fushimi Inari-taisha, a shrine complex known for its “thousand torii”. Inari is worshipped as the patron of business, and there is a tradition for businesses to donate a torii gate to the shrine.

Fushimi Inari-taisha is very photogenic and very popular. The torii are arranged so as to form tunnels along the paths up the hill, and their uniform colour and size makes for unique and stunning views. The first few tunnels were full of people, as expected. But once you move up the hill, the crowds thin out very quickly.

Initially I thought that the sight of orange-red torii gates would get boring fast. I mean, how many identical gates do I want to look at? Then we started walking and saw just how much variety there was.

Torii on the shade side of the hill loomed almost spookily.

Small knee-high torii were propped up next to the path.

Further up the hill, the gates got smaller and less shiny.

Stairs and afternoon shadows.

Ingrid, for scale.

Turning around and looking back down the hill, you can see the writing on each gate. The torii are donated when making a wish or when a wish has come true, so I assume the writing details each donator’s wish.

Each time we rounded a corner, there were new, interesting views. We only turned back down the hill when the light really started failing.

Many of the torii were bright and shiny, especially near the entrance, but further up the hill there were those that had started fading and rotting with age – as well as brand new ones that had only just been erected.

Our walk up and down the paths was accompanied by the constant cawing of crows. There were giant hordes of them here. Mostly hidden in the trees, but we saw them when we had come down to the edge of the wooded hill.