Kiyomizu
Kiyomizu (meaning pure water) is a Bhuddist temple, with the current buildings built in 1633. There were no nails used in its construction, it is held together entirely by the joints in the wood. We wanted to see Kyoto for Sakura (cherry blossom) season, but unfortunately, the flowers were not yet out last weekend, and yesterday there was rain that knocked a lot of the flowers down. However, as you can see below, there were sill plenty of flowers left.
Click on the below image to see more photos:
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| Kiyomizu |
Where Hunter and I are fooling around kissing one another, legend has it that if a couple kisses under that gate, their love will last a lifetime. It can't hurt to have a bit of fun to test it out! After days of "get a room" comments, suddenly we were in trouble for not being enthusiastic enough!
On our way down the hill (most Japanese temples are located up on hill, presumably to make you earn the right to visit them), we stopped at a few shops. We didn't buy much, as things were mostly quite expensive, but there was one shop that let us sample a huge range of Japanese sweets (mostly sweet mochi - cooked sweetened rice pounded to make a sort of stretchy pastry, and filled with various fillings, we had bean paste, chocolate paste and strawberry paste among others), so of course we had to buy something there.
On our way down the hill (most Japanese temples are located up on hill, presumably to make you earn the right to visit them), we stopped at a few shops. We didn't buy much, as things were mostly quite expensive, but there was one shop that let us sample a huge range of Japanese sweets (mostly sweet mochi - cooked sweetened rice pounded to make a sort of stretchy pastry, and filled with various fillings, we had bean paste, chocolate paste and strawberry paste among others), so of course we had to buy something there.
Kinkakuji
Kinkakuji (The Golden Pavillion), is a Zen Bhuddist temple covered in gold leaf. I'm not sure how that fits into the idea of a minimalist lifestyle, but anyway...
The temple itself is spectacular (as one would expect of a large-ish building covered with gold), and the grounds are amazing, everything is covered with moss. Adam tells me that it takes hundreds of years of careful cultivation to get such an even carpet of moss.
A selection of pictures can be seen by clicking the below image:
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| Kinkakuji |
Tomorrow will be Osaka.
I don't think you need a good luck kiss under a magic gate to love each other forever. I knew from that time we went to Girraween that you two were perfect for each other. :) But I guess it couldn't hurt. :P
ReplyDeleteI've tasted that pastry bean paste thing. it was awesome!
That temple looks very interesting. Makes me want to go to Japan.