Jinguji Omizuokuri

**2 March, in the evening, and it is dark and cold.** The procession runs after nightfall in early March in a snow region. Dress for standing outside for hours. **Hand torches are pre-booked.** Carrying one in the procession requires a reservation through the city in advance. Watching is free. **Two kilometres of torches.** The route runs from the temple to the Unose pool on the Onyu river, and the line of several hundred torches through the dark is the image people come for. **Visit on an ordinary day as well.** Jinguji is a syncretic site with a torii in front of the main hall and a well that has fed a Nara ritual for over a millennium. It is quiet, wooded and almost unvisited outside the festival. **Todaiji draws it on 12 March.** If you are travelling on to Nara, seeing both ends of the same ritual ten days apart is a rare thing to be able to do.