Shinsen-en Garden

The Shinsen-en Garden features a vermilion bridge that arches sharply over a dark pond, surrounded by the quiet walls of a Buddhist temple. It began in the late eighth century as the private pleasure garden for the Emperor when the capital was established in Kyoto. During a severe drought in eight hundred twenty-four, the monk Kukai reportedly summoned a dragon from the depths of this pond to bring rain. The rain arrived, and the pond became a site of persistent prayer for centuries.