Rengeo-in Temple (Sanjusangen-do)

Also known as Sanjusangen-do, this 750-year-old temple features 1,001 Senju-Kannon statues housed in a 120-meter-long hall.

Sanjusan means thirty-three and gen is a unit of measurement referring to the size of the hall, while Senju Kannon is a “Goddesses of Mercy” who purportedly has thousands of hands. The long hall is imposing and contains a large wooden statue of the 1000-armed kannon with 500 smaller versions on either side—although smaller in this case only means human sized, so it’s pretty impressive. In case you begin to count, the statues do not actually have 1000 arms, only 42—but they still look impressive.

You can catch the number 100, 206 or 208 buses to get there or walk for around 20 minutes from Kyoto Station.