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Just a five minute train ride from the center of Kamakura is the Daibutsu, a giant Buddhist statue. This bronze statue was created 761 years ago. My husband’s grandfather has photos of himself with the Daibutsu from 1945 when he was stationed outside Kamakura and while the statue’s surroundings alter, it remains unchanged. We paid twenty yen (about 20 US cents) to climb inside the Daibutsu and felt like we stepped back in time. Kamakura is about an hour train ride from Tokyo and the giant Buddha is one of many great sights for a day trip close to Tokyo.

Trademark notch at the top of Nokogiriyama (“Saw Mountain”) near Futtsu in Chiba Prefecture, Japan. The mountain features a distinctive sawtoothed profile of a Japanese saw, due in part to the mountain’s history as a stone quarry during the Edo period. The western side of the mountain is also the site of the sprawling Nihonji temple complex, which is home to two Daibutsu (Big Buddha) sculptures--the largest pre-modern, stone-carved daibutsu in Japan at roughly 31 meters in height, and the Hyakushaku (“hundred-shaku (unit of ancient measurement)) Kannon, a large relief image of Kannon carved into one of the quarry walls. There are also 1500 hand-carved jizou (arhat, or stone Buddha) sculptures, which combined with the spectacular scenery of the Bōsō Hills and Tokyo Bay, make Mount Nokogiri a must-see (although make sure you bring your hiking boots--it’s a steep climb to the top!).

Sail around the islands of Honshu, Shikoku, and Kyushu in Japan and the pretty port city of Busan in South Korea for a trip filled with food and colorful traditions.

Huge and imposing—in fact, one of the largest wooden buildings in the world—the Todaiji was founded in 752 C.E. As big as the structure is now, it’s still only two-thirds of what it originally was. Besides being notable for its size and UNESCO World Heritage Site standing, the temple houses one of Japan’s greatest artistic treasures, the 15-meter-tall (49-foot-tall) Daibutsu. Usually, throughout Asia, the bigger a statue of Buddha is, the worse it is artistically. The Daibutsu, a staggering work of bronze art, is an exception. When it was first conceived, the Japanese themselves weren’t quite good enough with bronze, so they brought in Korean artists to bail them out. A don’t-miss spot.