Ryoanji Temple

Ryoanji Temple is very famous from its
rock garden. It was designed for monks
to meditate in front of the garden. The garden was made of only rocks,  small white stones,and green moth. I wanted to see the garden in silence, but it was impossible because there were so many visitors!
I was one of them, so I know that I should not complain about it, but I was a little bit
disappointed.

rock garden

The rock garden is very sophisticated one, and it is what you should see at first priority in this temple.

There is aother garden with flowers, trees, and a pond.We can walk around the pond  

and enjoy the various views from different sites.I enjoyed the views a lot. So I recommend you to see other gardens along with the famous rock garden when you visit Ryoanji Temple.

Ninnaji Temple

   This morning I started walking at 9:00
from my house to Ninnaji Temple. It takes
2 hours walking to the temple. At Ninnaji,
I could see beautiful ao-momiji(maple trees  with green leaves).Red leaves of maple trees in autumn are very beautiful, but I also like green leaves in early summer.

 Ninnaji was founded in 888.It has very long history. The minister of this temple had been from emperor´s family until 1864.

Nioumon(the gate with two gardian gods )

palace

 Gardens were full of green.
Seeing them from the veranda
I was refreshed a lot.

long veranda

the building is surrounded with corridors

I walked a lot and a little bit tired,  but green leaves and beautiful garden made me
refreshed.

Owl Cafe and Bengal Cat Cafe

     I had known that there is an owl cafe on the street to Togetsukyo Bridge,  and been
interested in it a lot. My friend came to visit
my home and we decided to go to the owl cafe. At the entrance, we learned there is also a Bengal cat cafe. My friend loves cats
so we bought tickets for both of cafes.
First, we entered the owl cafe. We
could take photos of owls and touch them.

the owl is watching the street

There were many kind of owls. They were cute but they rarely moved so they seemed
like figures.
Next, we entered the Bengal cat cafe. We had 30 minutes making friends with cats.
 Cats were moving freely in the room. There were about ten cats. We could take photos and touch them. We were not allowed to
hold them. The staff said,゛If you are lucky,
cats will ride on your laps.¨and I was lucky!
One of the cats came to me, and laid on my
lap!  I had a happy time with her.

her name is Seimei

another cat on the tree

Daihikaku Senkoji Temple

    I went to the temple, in the mountain by the upper reach of Katsura River.It takes
about 20 minutes to walk from JR Saga Arashiyama Station.
   I watched a program about this temple on
TV. In this program, I saw the monk of the
temple was viewing the full moon with
a cute Shiba dog. I have been wanting to
visit the temple to see the cute ShiBa dog
until then
I hadn't known  this  dog was Sumire, the shiba dog of Senkoji Temple,when I met the dog on the way to the temple, but I would see her in the temple to know she had been Sumire.

On the way to Senkoji, I saw the beautiful scenery of
the upper stream of the Katsura River.

This is the sign board telling the way for Daihikaku, Senkoji Temple.
I would realy see the great view from the temple when I reached the temple, but at that time, I thought
this sign board was fishy.

I walked along the river

I arrived the entrance of the temple.
There is a big bell.

You can gong the bell freely, but only three times.

From the temple building located at the middle of the mountain, you can see the great view of Arashiyama.

the roof of the bell house

We could sit on the bench on the balcony, and I enjoyed the beautiful scenery from it for some time.

The room was ready for the tea ceremony.

The temple has only a small garden, but it was full of flowers named Shaga. I felt like being in the heaven.

The temple buildings are very small. They were originally built as a mountain hat by a
famous merchant, named Suminokura Ryoi
who founded the river transport system on
the Katsura River and the Hozu River in
16th century.

The monk´s office. 

Sumire, the shiba dog was not in the temple site when I arrived there because she had gone to welcome visitors with the monk down the mountain.  At that time, I realized that I had already met her!

Sumire the shiba dog came back some time later. She was very small as a shiba dog.
Maybe she is a mame-shiba(a miniature dog).

I heard that we can  enjoy silent time and great scenery by ourselves if we go there around 9:00a.m.  So you should  go this temple about 9:00 a.m, but don't tell this

to others!

Sakuramochi

    I went to buy sakura-mochi (cherry blossom rice cake) to the shop by Togetsukyo Bridge in Arashiyama. There are many intereisting shops on the street to Togetsukyo Bridge, like owl cafe or Rirakkuma goods shop.
 Sakuramochi commonly has sweet beans paste at the center of the rice cake,
but sakuramochi of this shop, Kotokiki-chaya  is made of only rice cake and salted cherryblossom leaves. It has cherry blossom flavor and it is not too sweet.
You can eat it with salted leaves. Please try it when you visit Arashiyama.

These are sakuramochi I bought 

Rirakkuma figure in front of the shop

sakuramochi shop

Arashiyama 2nd day

At 8:00 on Sunday morning, I went to the lane through the bamboo grove near

Tenryuji Temple. 

This bamboo grove is very famous for its beautiful scenery. It is very difficult to take nice photos because there are almost always a lot of tourists during daytime 

especially on weekends. So I went there at 8:00 a.m expecting to keep the beautiful scenery to myself and take photos without  people. I realized that it was

too optimistic! Some people were already there. I couldn't monopolize the scenery, but I could take pictures of bamboo grove without people, anyway.

Tenryuji-Temple

 Bamboo grove

In the afternoon, I went to Daikakuji-Temple.  In the garden of Daikakuji-Temple,
there are Osawa Pond very famous place for cherry blossom viewing.

Osawa Pond

Daikakuji Temple

Arashiyama, Kyoto

April 6, 2018

  I'm a licensed guide. I live in Yokohama and have an apartment in Kyoto.
I love to walk around Kyoto visiting a lot of temples and shrines in Kyoto.
Last weekend, I visited Arashiyama, Kyoto. Arashiyama is located in the northwestern region of Kyoto. It is a very popular tourist destination especially in　spring with beautiful cherry blossoms, and in fall with autumn leaves.

Saturday night,　I went to the area near Togetsukyo Bridge (the famous bridge
at the center of Arashiyama  area). Cherry blossoms were lit up. With the full moon, they were very beautiful.

I went to eat dinner at Yu-dofu restaurant. Yu-dofu is boiled tofu(soy bean curd).
I ate yu-dofu, vegetablle tempura, and pickled vegetables. They are very tasty and good for health. Vegetalian and vegan people should eat there.



top left: yu-dofu restaurant
bottom left: vegetable tempra
right: yu-dofu