The Byakushin of Joganji Temple

A juniper this old should stand straight, and this one does the opposite: its trunk twists into a spiral and leans hard to the south, a shape recorded as far back as a 1938 government survey. At Joganji Temple above Yugawara, one stop by train from Atami, the Byakushin has been growing this way for well over 800 years. The temple's own founding is bound up with the tree. Local tradition credits either the Kamakura-period warlord Doi Sanehira or his lord Minamoto no Yoritomo, whose retainer founded Joganji, with the planting, though nothing dates the tree to either man directly, so the story stays a story rather than a measured age. What is measured is the trunk: 6.3 metres round at breast height, 8.5 metres at the base, rising 20 metres into a crown that spreads unevenly, heavier on one side than the other from centuries of leaning the same way. The Agency for Cultural Affairs designated it a national Natural Monument in 1939, and photographs from 2024 show the same healthy crown, with only minor dieback on its north side. The stone steps past the temple gate climb to a plaza east of the main hall, where the juniper has been twisting itself into its own shape for the better part of a millennium, free to see, no ticket required.