Just a few kilometres from the centre of Nara is the Horyu-ji temple complex which dates back to the 7th Century AD. Horyu-ji is a UNESCO world heritage site and well worth a visit if you are in Nara.
The site contains a collection of wooden structures that typify Japanese Buddhist architecture and are situated in perfectly manicured grounds.
They are only half an hour drive in the car or you can take a train from the Kintetsu station to Horyu-ji station or take the 97 bus from Nara JR station. It is a very popular tourist spot and will be busy at the weekends. We went on a Monday morning and pretty much had the place to ourselves.
I really enjoyed wandering around the site looking at the beautiful temple buildings and grounds. Entrance to main site was about ¥1000 and we paid another ¥1000 to visit Ikaruga Gosho temple, which houses a rare sitting Bodhisattva with one leg pendant and is said to be one of three smiling masterpieces of the modern world, the other two being the Sphinx of Egypt and the Da Vinci’s Mona Lisa.
As it was lunchtime when we left the site we decided to try a local café, called Zadan. It looked very humble from the outside and I feared it may not be much good. However, it turned out to be a lovely place for lunch.
The entrance foyer had some art and crafts on sale and the restaurant itself had homely feel about it. It was run by a young couple and if it was in London, you would say it was a hipster business, but without the inflated prices!
The menu was not extensive, but it was good value, with most meals costing around ¥1000. I had the curry and rice which came with a salad and a small mug of soup. It was very good and we enjoyed a long lazy lunch recovering from our walking around the temples in the heat of the day.
If you visit Nara and have time for a little detour, the temple site of Horyu-ji is a rewarding place to visit. Go see the smiling masterpiece that is on a par with the Mona Lisa and Sphinx, it really is an excellent day out.