#1. Itabashi

Cycling may be something that I love to do but I’m not really one who goes for a ride without some kind of aim whether it be to a restaurant, a sight or just my workplace. With that in mind, and desperate to get out on my new bike, I decided to cycle round ALL the Inari Shrines in Tokyo taking each of the 23 wards one at a time.

Inspired by recent interest in tiny shrines, this idea seemed like a good way of hunting them down in a slightly orderly fashion. This really is not so much about the actual Inari Shrines but just getting out on my bike and having a means to an end. Please note that there are many more Inari Shrines (as well as other shrines) than what’s listed below but these were all the ones registered on Google Maps. The times in brackets next to the name of the shrines note the (approximate) time of day I was at each place.

Starting Point: Tokyo Fox Global Operations Centre, Itabashi-ku (11:13)

1. Inari Shrine @ 1-4-6 Sakuragawa (11:21)

2. Akatsuka Komagata Inari Shrine @ 1-25-2 Akatsukashinmachi (11:38)

3. Inari Shrine @ 4-29-6 Narimasu (11:55)

4. Inari-jinja Shrine @ 5-31-11 Tokumaru (12:14)

5. Inari Shrine @ 7-16-7 Tokumaru (12:21)

6. Inari Shrine @ 2-6-29 Nishidai (12:36)

7. Inari Shrine @ 48-3 Hasunumacho (13:02)

8. Shimizu Inari Shrine @ 54-1 Miyamotocho (13:13)

9. Yamanaka Inari Shrine @ 36 Nakacho (13:24)

10. Fushimi Inari Daimyojin Shrine @ 11 Kumanocho (13:37)

Date: Wednesday 20th May 2020

Weather: Cloudy

Area: 32.22 km²

Distance: 24.73 km

Time: 1.56 hrs

Calories Burned: 764

Top: Leicester City 2019-2020 away shirt

Notes: No better place to start this new series than my local ward and so a few of these were already familiar to me but it was particularly interesting to discover numbers 2-5 above which were the kind of tiny little shrines I’m after in this series. It seemed like the fourth one was in the corner of someone’s garden as it really is hidden away from public view. The sixth and tenth ones were part of a much bigger complex with the Inari shrine tucked away to the side.

Fox Rating: 8/10

Nearby Sights: Tokyo Daibutsu, Hikarigaoka Park

Click here to read ‘TF Top 10……Tokyo Themed Cycling Rides’