Japan: Kyoto in Autumn

Incase I haven't mentioned it in a previous blog, Kyoto is certainly my favorite city I've visited thus far in Japan. It's close enough to Osaka to easily visit, and has multiple stations along the same railway my home is on in Neyagawa. It takes about 35 minutes or so by train, has hundreds of temples and shrines, and excellent shopping for all budgets. Kyoto is especially popular in the fall for the scenery of it's colorful changing leaves. It's like adding a gorgeous backdrop to an already beautiful stand-alone image--a temple!

When people first were talking all about Kyoto in the fall and how amazing it was to see the leaves changing colors I thought it couldn't be much different than at home in Cleveland. We have the metro parks and we have trees at our own homes, that change colors. And although I do think it is more extreme because of how few trees are in the city vs. the amount of trees at the temples in Kyoto, it is just as amazing as everyone said, because of the combination of temples and colorful scenery; Not to mention how vibrant the leaves are! Between November and so far in December I've gone to Kyoto three different times to see three different temples. This blog I'm only going to post about the first trip!

In mid-November, I went to Kodaiji Temple with 4 friends in the evening to see the trees and temples illuminated. They light up the temple complex and re-open it at night (usually temples close around 5pm).

Before going straight to the temple, we walked around Kyoto a little bit. This first picture is on our way to the temple just as the sun was setting =). The temple was at the top of a hill, and there was just over an hour wait to get in. Takemura-san was kind enough to stand in line while Mika, Tamaki, and I looked in some of the nearby shops.

When we reached the temple and the front of the line , this picture to the right was the first I took. Talk about perfect lighting and perfect timing. I think we chose the perfect night to go and see the trees and temple lit up!

It probably took around an hour to walk through the whole complex. And it was pretty busy, so managing to have a stranger snap a quick photo of the four of us was a bit tricky, but impressive--as you can see though, a bit blurry ;-).

This is a picture of a display on the temple grounds that lit up with different colors and patterns. Each round piece you see is actually an umbrella, and there are some pieces that aren't even lit up in this picture. Pretty neat.

Rocks on meticulously raked gravel are another common thing seen within a temple complex. I'm not always sure of their meaning, but it certainly adds a unique perspective to the photo. I like this one because of the simplicity of the rocks, the detail and variety of colors in the trees, and the mountains you can see in the background, if you look close enough!

Another reason it was a perfect night to visit was because there was no wind!! So any small pond within the temple was as smooth as glass, giving the perfect reflection of the colorful lit up trees. This was definitely a crowded area where EVERYONE wanted to get a picture. But we managed to wiggle our way in enough to get pictures from two different angles.

The last portion of the complex was the bamboo garden, where soooo many tall bamboo trees were lit up. They had an umbrella display in the middle of all the trees, like the other photo I showed, but I don't have a picture to post.

This I think is just another awesome photo. Colors, lights, mountains, trees, temple, water, <3

Tamaki, Mika, and me =)

After Kodaiji we took a bit of a different route back, and walked around a little bit more before finding dinner. We came out of the famous temple of Gion, and to the left is a picture from across the street! I have a similar photo in one of my earlier blogs, from the daytime view.

Well, that pretty much wraps up my trip to Kyoto to see illuminated temples! Hope you enjoyed, and as usual I leave you with the randoms!

Friends at 30cm Bar and Café! Went to listen to "Live Jazz". The woman in the front left sang, and the man on the right played the guitar! And yes, I realize I've got double bunny ears in this photo...haha

Went to an "Art Aquarium " at a castle...some really funky looking fish, and displays with fish and lights and music.

Awhile back, my same co-worker who planned the Mt. Fuji adventure, and her husband, invited me to their home. They live in a small town in Kyoto, and I went to see a parade during the day("Mikoshi") and a festival at night ("KYOKA"). Before the parade, we wandered around their town a little bit...I got to see a small sake gallery and learned about this guy to the right (the famous mascot of their town)....creepy little dude.

Morisaki-san, our Mt. Fuji master planner took this photo of me,
Masu-san (her husband) and their son Yuta at the parade!

The shrine coming our way! And these girls dancin' along! Not sure who the guy on the horse is.

These men carried this shrine up and down so many streets!

I really like this shot I took of this family...shows the true traditional style of the festival! Wish I could give them this photo.

The second festival was KYOKA festival. A giant tree torch was lit and marched through the town as it burned. The ashes and palms remaining on the street would be picked up by everyone walking through, and are kept near the kitchen to protect from fire!

*(Perfect example of how I sometimes forget English....I just typed "holy leaves at easter" into google, because I couldn't think of the word "palms").

Nightview of Osaka from Umeda Sky Building's Floating Garden! Went with a couple HR members and a co-worker at Neyagawa, but different Department.

This is a ninja cracker. We went to a "Ninja" restaurant where they did silly "magic" tricks and Ninja-type things. Like busted through the door to take us to our table. haha or turned their Ninja sword into a scroll menu. It was fun, entertaining and funny, and certainly recommended for anyone looking for something a little different to do for dinner. Goodjob Shuhei for finding this one!