The Kyoto Trip

In Japan when the leaves change it's a BIG DEAL. I'm serious. On the news they talk about the status of the leaves in different areas of Japan and when the best time to view the leaves are. Kyoto happens to be one of the more famous places to check out this beautiful time of year. The following is my experience in Kyoto checking out the changing of the leaves and the Temples.



This is an example of ENGRISH... Japanese clothes designers will often throw anything on clothing if it has english... well poor Saya didn't realize what this meant in English... We had fun teasing her about it.



All of us gathering to decide where to go first.



Us having fun walking down the back roads to our first place... Keep in mind how narrow the road is... just remember that for a bit.



Our first stop was this temple. We didn't go in, but it was very pretty and cool to take a picture of this Pagoda. We weren't too keen on paying to enter any of the temples we went to... for many reasons, but it was still very beautiful.



Reason 1 for why I asked you to keep in mind the picture of the road in the last picture... This is a picture of one of the roads we went through to get to another temple... The day we went to Kyoto happened to be a very popular day...



The same pagoda pictured above.


A temple with a huge buddha... Many of you may know that I'm buddhist, but none of these temples have anything to do with my school of buddhism... i'm sure you didn't care.



Another temple with a bunch of people... and the tree in the background is the main attraction... rather many trees like it. This theme of "bunch of people" is a theme to keep in mind.



Me, Sho and Hide taking a picture together of that tree above.



Another beautiful tree.



Mayu and Saya 100 yard dash... Mayu won by a bunch... Saya just can't run well.



The tree in the background is really pretty...



This has nothing to do with trees or temples... but it was a cool car.



Reason 2 for keeping in mind the picture of the road and "bunch of people." This was on our way to Kiyomizu Dera a famous temple in Kyoto and a World Historical Site. It's hard to see from this picture, but we are crammed in the road like sardines. I have never been in a crowd this large, this packed, and this determined to to get to the same destination. Hide was surprised too.



Finally Kiyomizu Dera. This was the main gate and the whole temple ground was roped off so people had to enter through the main gate. There was a huge line and we all tried to do our best to avoid paying, but unfortunately we had to pay to check it out... so we sucked it up and paid.



The large crowd is what we had to hike through in order to get to the Temple... and most of the crowd in the background is actually the line to enter the temple and buy your ticket... We kinda cheated and sent Mayu and Hide to sneak through the line, buy all our tickets, and then hand them to us through the gate... it worked.



A beautiful picture of the gate on the Temple Grounds.








This light could be seen for miles and was shining at the top of the Temple... once we arrived at the top of the Temple we took a break and began to make jokes about the beam of light... Sho said it's a huge Marlboro cigarette....

It was a wonderful trip and we had a great time visiting the historical sites and seeing the beautiful trees. Afterwards we hit up some "Yaki Niku," or barbecue I guess... We ate a ton and it was delicious. I highly recommend that you experience this event in Kyoto if you're ever in Japan.