Ise-ji: Walk With Me

Allow me to share what I love about a good walk in Japan: I love the small villages, coming across a rusted and worn down kissa, sipping a ¥200 cup of the dankest coffee around, listening to an 80 year old mama relay debauched stories of love lost over a slice of pizza toast. I love the Japan-walking clichés, those moments in the forest, alone, uguisu birdsong above, winds shifting the bamboo treetops like a Ghibli film loop, stopping to catch my breath next to a grave marking the spot where a loyal horse conked out two hundred years ago.