Northern Higashiyama is the monumental, open end of the eastern hills — a giant gate, a copy of a palace, and a Meiji waterway that runs the length of the walk. Okazaki was laid out for a national exhibition in the 1890s and still feels built for crowds and grand gestures; the canal stitches it together and carries you up to Nanzen-ji at the end.
From Higashiyama it's a short walk to the torii, twenty-four metres of vermilion steel over the road — stand back and take it before you pass under. Through it stands Heian Shrine, an 1895 jinja built as a scaled copy of the old imperial palace; the outer court is free, the teien (garden) worth paying for when the weeping cherries are out.
Then west along the Okazaki canal, cherry banks and a tour boat in spring, past the renovated Kyocera Museum of Art. Stop at the small Lake Biwa Canal Museum — ten minutes that explain the whole waterway — then follow it up the Keage Incline, rails underfoot, to Nanzen-ji and the Tozai line.
