Thanks for all my birthday wishes! I had a great weekend. We went to Kyoto. Friday was a national holiday, so Gen had a day off work. We left Friday morning and returned Sunday night. We took the
shinkansen (bullet train) which is the best way to travel. Here's Gen in front of the train. I'm pretty sure he thought I was a dork for wanting to take this picture.
We left our bags with the hotel and went out exploring right away. It had just stopped raining, so I thought some of the more touristy attractions might be less crowded. This is
Kinkakuji, or the Golden Pavilion. The whole building is covered with gold leaf. We actually looped around twice to get this picture after the sun came out. We totally lucked out on the weather. It rained almost the entire train ride down and stopped about an hour before we arrived. Saturday was gorgeous. Sunday there was a 90% chance of rain, but it stopped raining right after we finished breakfast and didn't start again until we were in the train station at 3:00.
A phoenix on top of the pavilion. It was built in the 1200's and was originally a residence, but converted to a temple in the early 1400's.
Here's me. The pond is called Mirror Pond.
A small island in the gardens. You can't see it in this picture, but there's a fallen tree that serves as the bridge to the island. Everything is meticulously maintained.
Fierce looking little thing, isn't it? This is a close up of one of the surrounding buildings. I think it was the exit gate (just past the souvenir shops, natch).
I've forgotten what this is called, but it's on the mountain right outside the temple. In the fall during one of the main festivals it is set on fire. I bet that looks amazing. We took about 150 pictures over the weekend, so I'll have lots of posts this week. Check back!
Thanks for all my birthday wishes! I had a great weekend. We went to Kyoto. Friday was a national holiday, so Gen had a day off work. We left Friday morning and returned Sunday night. We took the shinkansen (bullet train) which is the best way to travel. Here's Gen in front of the train. I'm pretty sure he thought I was a dork for wanting to take this picture.
We left our bags with the hotel and went out exploring right away. It had just stopped raining, so I thought some of the more touristy attractions might be less crowded. This is Kinkakuji, or the Golden Pavilion. The whole building is covered with gold leaf. We actually looped around twice to get this picture after the sun came out. We totally lucked out on the weather. It rained almost the entire train ride down and stopped about an hour before we arrived. Saturday was gorgeous. Sunday there was a 90% chance of rain, but it stopped raining right after we finished breakfast and didn't start again until we were in the train station at 3:00.
A phoenix on top of the pavilion. It was built in the 1200's and was originally a residence, but converted to a temple in the early 1400's. 
Here's me. The pond is called Mirror Pond.
A small island in the gardens. You can't see it in this picture, but there's a fallen tree that serves as the bridge to the island. Everything is meticulously maintained.
Fierce looking little thing, isn't it? This is a close up of one of the surrounding buildings. I think it was the exit gate (just past the souvenir shops, natch). 
I've forgotten what this is called, but it's on the mountain right outside the temple. In the fall during one of the main festivals it is set on fire. I bet that looks amazing. We took about 150 pictures over the weekend, so I'll have lots of posts this week. Check back!
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