Thursday – April 5, 2012 – Visit to Kyoto
Last night before departing we decided that today we would
visit the pottery place out in the country.
But this morning when we woke and talked to Kana and James it was
decided that Atsuko (Kana’s mom) would drive us to Kyoto instead. Great!
It took almost an hour and a half to drive to Kyoto. We talked and caught a cat nap. When we got there it started to rain a
little, and of course we were hungry. So, we ate lunch at a local restaurant,
the Tofu House. It was such great food, all made with tofu.
Afterwards, the rain passed and eased a little, so we
enjoyed some sight-seeing around this very historic area and shopping in little
quaint local stores. We walked down a path
in a bamboo forest, there was some massively large bamboo! Amazing.There was a spot to stop at a shrine and make a wish. James and I tossed in a coin each, rang the bell to get the God's attention, and clapped twice, bowed then said our prayer in silence.
Along the path was the ‘back entrance’ to a
world cultural heritage site, the Tenryu-ji zen temple, the head of the
Tenryu-ji branch of Rinzai Zen Buddhism (est. 1339). The weather was still
overcast, rainy and chilly, but we enjoyed walking around the grounds of the temple. We saw a large koi pond, zen rock gardens,
and beautiful flowering trees. It was
very serene and peaceful.
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| A cherry blossom trying to bloom |
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| Mom :) |
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| One of many blooming beautiful trees |
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| In front of temple |
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| Temple with koi pond and rock garden |
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| How old is this tree??? |
We enjoyed green
tea latte with a treat (mochi stuffed with sweet bean and wrapped with cherry
blossom leaf) afterwards to warm up a little, and then returned to Namba. If I could return anywhere in Japan it would be back to Kyoto. I sense that this area has so much to offer, and we didn't even scratch the surface.
We
finished the day with a curry dinner (Japanese style) across the street from the hotel… yummy!
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| Very small curry restaurant - only 6 seats! |
It took almost an hour and a half to drive to Kyoto. We talked and caught a cat nap. When we got there it started to rain a
little, and of course we were hungry. So, we ate lunch at a local restaurant,
the Tofu House. It was such great food, all made with tofu.
Afterwards, the rain passed and eased a little, so we
enjoyed some sight-seeing around this very historic area and shopping in little
quaint local stores. We walked down a path
in a bamboo forest, there was some massively large bamboo! Amazing.There was a spot to stop at a shrine and make a wish. James and I tossed in a coin each, rang the bell to get the God's attention, and clapped twice, bowed then said our prayer in silence.
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