Private Spiritual Hike in Hidakamura with Mountain Monk

A wonderful day in the mountains with a really interesting mountain monk!

I would highly recommend spending a day with Taichi Tani learning about Shugendo, local history and talking about life in general. Taichi's origin story is really interesting and it was fascinating to hear about his journey to taking over his family temple and becoming a Shugendo monk. This might be described as "Shugendo light" and there are more hardcore Shugendo experiences in Japan where you actually go through the aesthetic practice as an actual monk would. While Taichi is kitted out in full Shugendo gear, complete with a big conch shell trumpet, participants walk in their own clothes and chatting is encouraged. The course was really pretty and the view from the top of the mountain was awesome and following Taichi up and down the trail felt quite adventurous. The vegan bento was delicious and even meat-eaters in the group were very happy with it :) The final (before the walk back to the start) caving section was much more thrilling than I expected and I really enjoyed it. I was very grateful for Taichi’s guidance in the dark, squeezing through some tight spots. I would advise people who get nervous in tight spaces to skip this part of the tour.