Kaeru Shrine

Established in 2010 on Yunomachi Street in the Gero Onsen area, Kaeru Shrine features a unique name derived from a wordplay between "Gero" (the name of the onsen) and the Japanese onomatopoeia for a frog's croak, "gero gero”.

The deity enshrined here is Kaeru Daimyojin. Step onto the grounds to find extra luck for a full host of wishes, including wealth (via the custom of a "gamaguchi" coin purse) and safe travel mercies (from the word "kaeru," meaning "to return"). When you offer a coin to the stone statue of Kaeru Daimyojin in the center of the shrine, you can hear a sacred oracle. The left hand of the statue holds votive tablets (ema), and the right hand holds fortune slips (omikuji). Write your wishes on an ema (400 yen each) and hang it up, or try your luck with an omikuji (100 yen each).

Keep an eye out for frog-centric designs across the shrine, including on stone lanterns, the water purification basin, and other fun places just waiting for you to spot. There is also a monument marking the site where Tadataka Ino, the cartographer who completed the first map of Japan, stayed.