A wide shallow river crossed by a long low bridge, with a bamboo grove and a walled temple garden a short walk from the bank.
What Arashiyama looks like
The river has three names along one course, the Hozu through the gorge above town and the Katsura by the bridge, with the Oi further upstream. crosses it on a concrete roadway rebuilt in 1934, flanked by pedestrian walkways and wood-style parapets. A wooden bridge had stood at the same crossing since at least 836. Wooded hills rise straight from the far bank, and flat-bottomed pleasure boats and cormorant fishing punts work the water below the bridge in summer. cuts across the current a short way upstream.
A stone path through the Arashiyama Bamboo Grove runs from to , walled in on both sides by bamboo stalks tall enough to close out the sky overhead. The bamboo is still cut for traditional crafts rather than left purely for show.
's garden, laid out by Muso Soseki at the temple's 1339 founding, sits at the grove's southern end. The pond and rock arrangement keep that original layout, and the halls around them date from the Meiji period.
Northwest of the temple, keeps a row of machiya and thatched roofs along the old road toward Mount Atago. North of the bridge generally, the crowds thin and small temples sit scattered at the base of the wooded hills.
Shot in Arashiyama
The 1982 film Seiha starred Toshiro Mifune and Mariko Okada and filmed in the garden beside Tenryu-ji's main hall. Saga Toriimoto's preserved street has been used the same way in period dramas, standing in for the road between Edo and Kyoto.
Seiha, 1982
Tenryu-ji's garden
Seiha filmed in the garden beside the temple's main hall. The pond and rock arrangement there date from the temple's 1339 founding, while the hall itself is a Meiji period reconstruction. Street View
What Arashiyama can double for
Shinkyo Bridge in Nikko, Tochigi
The arched, vermilion-lacquered Shinkyo Bridge crosses the Daiya River against the same kind of forested slope as the Togetsukyo crossing. The current structure dates from 1904, and the design has carried since 1636. Shinkyo's vermilion lacquer and steep camber read differently from Togetsukyo's flat concrete roadway and plain wood-style parapets, so a shot held tight on the water and hills works better than a wide one that shows the color. Try searching arched bridge forested river now.
Nagatoro in Chichibu, Saitama
The same traditional flat wooden boats that work the Hozugawa river below Togetsukyo also work Nagatoro's Arakawa gorge, poled by a standing boatman, with forested slopes rising straight from the water on both banks. The Iwadatami rock shelves along Nagatoro's bank are a flatter, more stratified formation than Arashiyama's rounded riverbed stones, so a close shot of the rocks gives it away. Try searching traditional wooden river boats now.
Juknokwon Bamboo Garden in Damyang, South Korea
Juknokwon's paths cut through dense stands of tall bamboo in the same kind of corridor as the walk through Arashiyama's grove, and the 2004 film R-Point shot a battle scene inside those same bamboo stands. Juknokwon's bamboo is a different, thicker variety planted in wider rows, so a tight shot straight down the path holds the illusion better than a wide one. Try searching dense bamboo corridor path now.
