Anyone who has ever taken a train to or past Ofuna in Kanagawa Prefecture will have proabably noticed the giant 25 metre-tall white goddess statue looming in the mountains just behind the station. It is not alone though as I spotted another one a few years back a further 42 kilometres south of Ofuna.

As someone who goes back and forth between Tokyo and Shizuoka about half a dozen  times every year I see this goddess statue quite often and always think I really should stop off and visit it……but never do! However, a fairly good opportunity to see it finally came earlier this month when I was on my way to Shonan from our holiday home in Shizuoka.

Hayakawa is an unstaffed station located between Odawara and Nebukawa stations on the JR Tōkaidō Line. Squint your eyes or just zoom in to the photo below and you can just about see the statue in the centre of the picture which was taken on the platform.

Just a five minute walk from the station on some quiet backstreets to the rear of the station is Tozen-in Gyoran Daikannon. The address is 482 Hayakawa, Odawara, Kanagawa-ken. It is fairly well signposted albeit only in Japanese.

The giant white goddess will guide you there with her head jutting out from beyond the main hall of a pleasant but fairly nondescript temple.

There are a further set of steps to the side of the temple which ascend to a cemetery where the giant kannon statue is located.

This statue is just over half the size of the one in Ofuna but it still has the same mystical Kannon powers. It was finished in 1982 after three years of construction, and is supposedly blessed with warding off evil, ensuring the safety of your family, and fulfilling your wishes.

With the Seisho By-Pass bridge and Sagami Bay in the background of Hayakawa Port, the white Kannon looks extraordinarily beautiful as it keeps a lookout over the city of Odawara where it is located. The Shinkansen (bullet train) also passes by to the rear of the statue.

Hayakawa station itself was quite a quaint building which was a reminder of a different era. That’s maybe not so surprising given that it originally opened 101 years ago!

A bottle of local drink Shonan Gold soda (below) was bought at the local convenience store and was a most welcome refreshment on the platform as I waited for the train to arrive on a very sunny day in early May.

Hiratsuka station was a further 25 minutes or so away and my main destination for the day. The reason was football, and a 30 minute walk north of the station took me to the stadium.

It’s been a pretty terrible season so far for Kashiwa Reysol, the team I support. However, this proved to be a good day and for the second season in a row, Reysol managed to beat Shonan Bellmare on their turf. Sadly that result didn’t manage to kick-start Reysol’s season! Maybe I ought to have prayed for victory at the aforementioned Kannon statue before every match!!

Click here to read ‘Unstaffed Stations Of Japan #5 – Nebukawa’

Click here to read ‘Tokyo Daytripper: Ofunakannon-ji Temple’

Click here to read ‘Tokyo Daytripper: A Morning In Odawara City’ 

Click here to read ‘Tokyo Daytripper: Taya Caverns In Ofuna’