Sunday 12 August 2007

A day trip to Kyoto . . . by myself!

12th August 2007

Well today I woke up and while having breakfast thought to myself that I should go somewhere today! I decided to visit Kyoto as there are so many beautiful things to see there and I want to see as many as I can before I leave. So I went to Kyoto for my first day trip by myself! I went to Ginkaku-ji which is the silver pavillion. My favourite temple in Kyoto is Kinkaku-ji which is the golden pavillion. But sadly Ginkaku-ji was never covered in silver! It is an amazing old temple though and the gardens are fantastic - beautiful rock gardens, moss covered ground and bamboo forests. I then went to the street leading to Kiyomizu-dera as it is lined with shops selling pottery and all kinds of souvenirs. It was a really good day and I now know that I can get around in Japan on my own!

Ginkaku-ji


The mound in front of the temple and the ground is actually all rocks - it almost looks like sand! It is meant to represent Mt Fuji and the rocks on the ground are representing waves. The amount of work that would go into it would be huge!


This was a place to pray and if you got your coin on the rock I think you also got good luck as some people were getting very excited when they hit the rock!


The beautiful gardens.


This is the entrance to Kiyomizu-dera. It looks fantastic against the summer sky!

1 comment:

Tinz said...

You are brave to go somewhere on your own. Good job!! :-)