Kanagawa · Kamakura / SasukeNo.274★Open in map →
Zeniarai Benzaiten
— the money-washing shrine of Kamakura
A shrine in the Sasuke valley west of Kamakura Station, entered through a rock tunnel, where visitors wash coins and notes in a cave spring in the hope of increasing their wealth.
Zeniarai Benzaiten Ugafuku Shrine sits in a bowl of hills in the Sasuke valley, west of Kamakura Station. You do not walk in through a gate; you walk in through a tunnel cut into the rock face, and come out into a rock-walled hollow lined with torii, shrine buildings and a cave spring. The custom that made it famous is simple and physical: you borrow a wicker basket at the shrine office, put your coins or folded notes in it, and ladle the spring water over them. The water is counted among Kamakura's five celebrated springs. It is one of the busiest small shrines in Kamakura and costs nothing to enter.
Background & history
The shrine's founding is dated to 1185 and attributed to Minamoto no Yoritomo, the first Kamakura shogun. The account is that a water deity appeared to him in a dream during a year of the snake and told him to draw the water welling up in this valley and make offerings with it, and that peace would follow across the land. He did so, and the shrine was established at the spring. The money-washing custom grew out of that origin — the water was first for offerings, and later for coins.
What to look for
- The rock tunnel entrance
- the approach is bored straight through the cliff, so the shrine appears all at once when you emerge
- The torii corridor
- a line of gateways leading from the tunnel mouth into the rock-walled hollow
- The cave spring
- the washing basin itself, in a small cave, counted among Kamakura's five celebrated waters
- The wicker baskets
- borrowed at the shrine office — coins, and folded notes, are laid in and rinsed with a ladle
How to enjoy it
Arrive close to the 8:00 opening: the hollow is small, and the difference between 8:15 and 11:00 here is the difference between hearing the spring and queueing at it. Bring the cash you want to wash and some coins for the office. Then walk eight minutes uphill to Sasuke Inari, a fox shrine under a tunnel of red torii that most people skip, and come back down toward Kamakura Station from there.
How to actually get there
- Tokyo Station → Kamakura Station (JR Yokosuka Line, direct, ~57 min).
- Kamakura Station west exit → the shrine (walk west and uphill, ~25 min).
- JR Yokosuka Line, then walk uphill
- Tokyo Station →(JR Yokosuka Line, direct, ~57 min)→ Kamakura Station →(walk from the west exit, ~25 min)→ the shrine. Total ~85 min. Trains run about every 10-15 minutes. The walk is flat at first through a residential valley, then climbs steadily for the last stretch.
- Down the hill, or over the ridge
- Walk back down to Kamakura Station in about 20 minutes and take the JR Yokosuka Line to Tokyo. Alternatively, continue up onto the Daibutsu hiking ridge trail and come down at the Great Buddha in Hase, finishing on the Enoden. The shrine closes at 16:30, so leave the ridge option enough daylight.
Before you go
- Cash
- There is no admission fee. Bring the cash you intend to wash, and small change for candles, incense and the basket at the shrine office. IC cards (Suica / PASMO) cover the train but nothing inside the shrine.
- Closing days
- Open 8:00-16:30. The cave and the washing basins are cramped; queue rather than crowd in, and take care not to block the passage while photographing.
- Another way
- Sasuke Inari Shrine is about eight minutes uphill from here, and the two are almost always walked together.
- After you get off
- From the Kamakura Station west exit, follow the signs west toward Zeniarai Benten through a residential valley — level for the first 15 minutes, then a steady climb to the tunnel entrance. About 25 minutes in total.