Picture updates

We've been pretty active recently just "touristing" around Kyoto. This is the time when people all over Japan come to Kyoto to see the leaves change color. It is something people back in Iceland can't really grasp. Back home, autumn lasts for 2 weeks and then it only takes one windy day and every single leaf has been blown off the trees.
The autumn has been slowly coming over the city and right about now the colors of the forests are just spectacular. Going places on public holidays or over weekends is not such a good idea at the moment because of crowds. Fortunately we have no classes on Wednesdays so we tend to use those for sightseeing.

I will let wikipedia do most of the introduction this time.
Let's get down to business...

Kinkakuji & Ryouanji
Kinkakuji is the location of the Golden Pavilion, which is probably among the most famous sites all over Japan. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kinkakuji
Japanese love their rock gardens and the one at Ryouanji is pretty amazing. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ryouanji


Kurama
We went again to the small town of Kurama, located in a valley north of here. If you have been following this blog, then that is the same place the fire festival was held at. Now we went in the daytime and visited the temple there up in the mountain. We walked this mountain path for a couple of hours and came down in the town next door. A muddy path, that one. We got to take nice pictures and see beautiful landscape in return.
That Kurama mountain has heavy ties to the history of Japan, as this is the place Yoshitsune spent his days in exile as a kid. I am guessing you are not familiar with Yoshitsune so if you want the short version, he is somewhere at the top of the "Most famous person in Japanese history" list. If you want the longer version, here it is: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minamoto_no_Yoshitsune


Fushimi Inari-taisha
This place is just nuts. Check the pictures and you will see why. You can also check the wikipedia entry: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fushimi_Inari-taisha
A part of that site was used for the Hollywood movie "Memoirs of a Geisha", or "Sayuri" like it's called in Japan.
We went the whole hiking trail from beginning to end and it took us about 4 hours. Quite a walk. Nice scenery though so it was OK. At one point there was a clearing in the trees and a view of the city faced us. Interesting how you can't see any tall buildings here. I heard somewhere that it wasn't allowed to build skyscrapers in Kyoto as that would ruin the city image.

That's all for now. Enjoy.