Ujigami Shrine

Most visitors to Uji see the Phoenix Hall of Byodo-in, buy matcha and leave. Cross the river by the small bridges to the east bank, walk up past Uji Shrine, and a few minutes later you reach a shrine that is older still, or at least its main hall is. Kyoto Prefecture lists the honden of Ujigami Shrine as the oldest shrine building in Japan, and tree-ring dating in 2004 put its timber at around 1060, within a decade of the Phoenix Hall across the water.

It does not look like much at first, and that is part of it. The honden is three small shrines in a row, the two outer ones larger than the middle one, all inside a sheltering outer hall, so you look in through its open front rather than walking round it. In front stands the haiden, built from early Kamakura timber in the style of a Heian nobleman's house, with low eaves and latticed shutters; it is thought to have come from an imperial villa. Both are National Treasures. There is no paint and no gold, just grey wood, gravel and trees.

Ujigami enshrines Emperor Ojin, his son Prince Uji no Wakiiratsuko and Emperor Nintoku. Until the Meiji era it and Uji Shrine below were one shrine in two parts, and it was treated as the guardian shrine of Byodo-in. In the grounds, the Kiribara-sui spring, one of Uji's seven named springs, still runs, and there is a small Kasuga shrine from the Kamakura period.

Ujigami is one of the 17 parts of the Historic Monuments of Ancient Kyoto, the World Heritage property inscribed in 1994; Byodo-in is the other part in Uji, so one short trip covers both. Entry is free. The shrine closes early, around 16:10 to 16:20, so do it before Byodo-in if you are coming in the afternoon. Twenty minutes is enough unless you sit for a while, which is the best thing to do here. If you have more time, the Kotozaka slope up to Kosho-ji is a few minutes further along the same road.