ENOSHIMA.

April 22nd, 2018

A sunny day in a little island.

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The past few days in Tokyo have been feeling like summer, with clear skies and high temperatures.

That resulted in the perfect time to explore Enoshima island, near Kamakura – just about 1 hour and a half train ride from Shibuya. 

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Felix and I met up with Emma, Arik and Joey at 10am by the Hachiko statue. We hopped on the train and once we arrived, we were greeted by this building wishing us a nice day.

Then there is a long bridge you can walk on to make you way to the island.

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My friends had all been there before, so I did my research to make sure I knew something about the island as well.

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What I’ve gathered is that there is a legend around it: the goddess of love, Benzaiten, created it after battling a sea dragon. In doing so, two theories formed:

She managed to imprison the creature deep into the caves of this island (you can actually visit Iwaya Caves);
She agreed to marry the dragon in order to tame him.

When I asked about this to my friends – after seeing some dragon statues and caves – they didn’t have a clue what I was talking about!

Regardless, I thought it was pretty cool how this place had its own legend.

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Lots of people come here because of the views of Mount Fuji: we didn’t get a clear sight, but even like this it looked so striking.

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The island was already very packed yesterday, but in summer time it’s said to be extremely busy, especially its beaches (Shonan beach in particular). We could already see a lot of windsurfers, and I can see why: it’s really windy.

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You can walk down a path that brings you to some rocks you can climb and walk around on, during low tide.

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Because of the sun heating up the rocks, we were able to walk on them pretty easily…

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even though some bits were more dangerous than others!

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If you get too close to the edges, chances are you would get splashed by water.

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After spending the morning hiking, we went back into the main area and stopped by for some food.

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It was such a warm day that in order to feel cool again, I ate some shaved ice (or as I like to call it, some ‘snow’).

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Then we made our way to the Shrine: there are 3 of them, all dedicated to the Benzaiten goddess.

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Here my friends thought me lots of new things: for example, these up here are bad fortunes.

You pick a fortune from a basket, in exchange for 100 yen, and if you get a bad one you tie it on these strings, as they will be burned later.

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I was curious to see what I would get, as finally I had someone that could translate my fortune for me, and it turns out I got ‘Big Luck’ – which apparently it’s really rare to get, as none of my friends ever got one!

This made me really happy, so I folded it back and I’m keeping it in my wallet.

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Another thing I was thought is how to wash your money for more money: there is this specific pond (not sure what the name is) where you can grab a basket, put in some money to dip into water, and then you throw it into a wooden box in the middle of the pond. If you make it, it will bring you more money.

It took me 5 tries but I was able to do it!

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As I said, this island has the theme of love, so in multiple spots you can do couple related things: one of which is ringing the love bell, in this stunning setting.

They even provide a stand where to put your camera to take your photo – they really think of everything!

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As you could probably see from the previous photo, you will find tons of lockets and pink ema attached to the railing surrounding this area.

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No matter where you are walking in the island, if you look up, you should be able to spot this tall building, called the Sea Candle.

We didn’t go up, but I figured I would at least show a photo of it.

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We walked over 20’000 steps, but the brief stops to grab some local sweets provided us with just the right amount of energy back, and the wind blowing in such a hot day made the heat bare-able.

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I honestly had an amazing time exploring this place, I would highly recommend it!

⃛ヾ(๑❛ ▿ ◠๑ )

Marzia