Students Hiyoshi

Ookute
(One of the post town in edo period)
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	Ookute used to be one of the post-town on the Nakasendo. Nakasendo is one of the famous road in Edo period (1603-1867). It was connected from Edo to Kyoto. Ookute is small town. The town has only about from seventy to one hundred houses. However the town is not so big, many people use this post-town. Then this town was the center of traffic and culture. The role was the same as Hosokute. This town was helped by twenty-three villages. The helping is ordinary system in Edo period. This town is about one and half ri east from Hosokute. Ri is the old unit in Japanese. One ri is about four kilometer. It is ninety and a half ri from this town to Edo. And it is forty-three and a half ri to Kyoto. The following is the record about this city.
Year 1818 1830 1854 1861 The number of the guests 35000 55000 85000 95000 The number of the pedestrians 100000 150000 250000 300000
We walked around this town in Autumn. There was an huge old Japanese cedar in the Jinmyou shrine. All of us are very surprised to see such a big tree. This is the "GOSHINBOKU" of this shrine. "Goshinboku" means an object of worship in a shrine and believed to contain the spirit of a deity. This tree is more than 1200 years old. This tree is 11 meters around and it is 60 meters high. In front of this tree, there was a spring. There was a cup on the table. We drank the water. It was at first a little bitter, but it turns to sweet. It was very delicious water. We think that it is very strange water. We hear that the pedestrians in Edo period were also drank this water as precious water. There is a pond near the tree. There are about twenty carps in the pond. We made a polite bow from the waist.
	There are some old shrines and structures in this town. There are many books, photos, old things and maps in the community center of Okute. When we walked around near here, we found a long stairs. We went up the stairs and counted. There are 113 stairs. Then we could see a little shrine. The name is Hakusan shrine. We like this places because many places are preserved with great care in here.

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