In my office, the ALTs' schedules are created several months in advance, because since we visit so many schools it takes a long time to get the schedule made. Therefore, if the ALTs want to take a vacation during what would normally be school visit times, we have to request it several months in advance. I had been toying with the idea of taking my own trip to Kyoto ever since I broke my leg last December and couldn't go on my originally planned trip with Travis, John, and Desi (see December 2002). When we were asked in August about our vacation plans for the next school term, I decided that I was going to make my trip happen and scheduled a few days of vacation around a holiday weekend in late October. What was going to be a pleasant time in Kyoto during the leaf changing season turned out to be one of the most enjoyable vacations I have ever had.

    These pages chronicle the four full days I spent in Kyoto. Please enjoy and take your time looking at the pictures. If you have any questions about what I saw or did, feel free to email me. Please keep in mind that many of the things that I visited are not only of great cultural, but also of great religious value to many people. If photography was prohibited, I abided by their requests. Therefore, I wasn't able to take my own pictures of many of the amazing things that I saw in Kyoto. However, I have scanned some pictures from brochures available and those photos are identified as such.

I spent Wednesday night in Osaka (right next to Kyoto) after getting off the flight from Asahikawa then Tokyo. I woke up early this morning and hopped on a train for Kyoto.
The first thing that impressed me about Kyoto was the Kyoto train station. It was immense! In Hokkaido, the Sapporo train station is also huge, but it's all designed to withstand cold, wintry weather. This train station was more of a grand glass and steel structure, with long endless staircases, vast open parts in the ceiling, and lots and lots to see. I'm not sure what they do in case of snow or torrential rain, but it was still amazing nonetheless.
The stage version of Beauty and the Beast was coming to the theatre in a month or so	The long staircase (or escalator) to the top right side
The glass ceiling
My first stop of the day was Ginakaku Temple. Ginkakuji Temple, a Zen temple, was built in 1482 by Ashikaga Yoshimasa, the eighth in the line of Muromachi Shogun who basically ruled Japan. He, as most rulers like him, built it to be his retirement home. Also, like most of the retirement homes of rulers in Kyoto, it became a temple after his death.
Ginkaku literally means "silver foil." It was the Shogun's intention to cover this paviliion completely in silver foil, however, he never was able to finish it. It was a pretty peaceful temple and it wasn't really crowded at that time in the morning yet.
When most people think of Zen, they think of Rock Gardens. Well, here they are...	They are raked into different patterns often to symbolize natural landscapes or scenes.
That's one big ant hill...	The view of the pavilion surrounded by fall leaves
A staircase (I took too many pictures...)	A rock graden from higher up the slope
The view back down the hill from the entrance
After leaving Ginakaku Temple, I walked out of the exit to find myself in quite a thick crowd of people - mostly tourists and high school students on their school trips. However, I noticed that one small side street to the right there were no people. I walked over and found myself in front of a nice shrine with no people at it. I can't tell you anything about it because I don't know any of its history, but it was a nice stop nonetheless.
The main entrance	A small shrine within the shrine precints
A guardian statue
Running from near the entrance of Ginkaku-ji Temple down towards the south is the "Path of Philosophy." It was a walking path along teh stream that linked all these temples in this area together.
A bridge along the path	Yes, I petted this cat and yes, it was probably a stray
One of the stops along the Path of Philosohpy was the Honen-in Temple. Officially called the Zenkisan Banbukyo-dera, Honen-in is the head of the Sansei School of the Jodo sect (got that?). This temple is where the priest Honen held his six o'clock worship.
A peaceful fountain	A statue facing the main hall
There's a story about this, but I don't know what it is...
Another stop along the Path was Nyakuoji Shrine. This was the water font in front of the shrine for purifying your hands and mouth before entering.
One of the charms of Kyoto, especially in nice weather, was the presence of rickshaws. All throughout the back streets and near the tourist spots were young men ready to pull giggling high school girls along the paths in a rickshaw (for a fee, of course).
Towards the end of the Path of Philosophy was Eikan-do (officially called Zenrin-ji, but apparantly no one uses that name). In 855, the priest Shinso turned Fukiwara Sekio's villa into this temple. It went through periods of decline and then prosperity. Sometime between 794 and 1185, a Buddhist monastery was built on-site, and it became more prestigious (the nickname "Eikan-do" means "Eternal View"). However, the temple was burnt to the ground during the Onin War, but was fully restored afterwards.
It was a lively place to be at that time, because there were several buddhist monks around going about their daily work and worship. Also, the tapestries on and around the temple really matched well with the slowly changing leaves of fall.
This was taken from one of the higher temple buildings. You can see the tapestries on the left side of the buillding, partially obscured by the trees.	It wasn't too windy, so I had to wait for a while in order to get this picture...
A fire .. er ... water breathing dragon. I found that there were a lot of little things in Kyoto, like this purification font, that were just as captivating as the larger statues or buildings. Of course, maybe I was just tired from all the walking...
There is an interesting story associated with this temple. In the late 11th century, a man name Eikan (hence, the temple's nickname), who was highly respected in his time, had built a hospital for the poor on the temple grounds. He strongly believed in Buddhism. One day, so the story goes, Eikan was chanting the Amida Buddha's name near the altar, when suddenly Amida Buddha came down from the altar and began to walk ahead of Eikan. He was so surprised that he couldn't move, which caused Amida Buddha to turn back over His shoulder and say, "Eikan, you are dawdling." Immediately afterwards, Eikan had a sculptor carve a statue of the Amida Buddha with His head turned to share this story with others. This picture is scanned from a pamphlet.
I soon found myself amidst several more temples. However, I really wanted to make it to Heian Shrine before I lost too much of the day, so I decided to pass on them. I did, however, make a stop at Sanmon. Sanmon (at the Nanzen-ji Temple) symbolizes the three roads to Buddhist liberation and is one of the three biggest gates in Japan. The original, built in 1296 was burned down, but later rebuilt in 1628.
Basically, it's a really big gate. I can imagine that back in the 1200s, it would have inspired wonder and fear in the eyes of those who saw it. The fear factor is gone, but it was still a wonder. The roof is made of baked clay tiles with 5 pillars and 3 entrances. It is approx. 22 meters tall. This picture is a view from the top.
Another view from the top, looking out on the path.	The stairs to get to the top were extremely steep. Somewhat of a difficulty for someone of my size...
Looking down the stairs from the top of the lower set of stairs.	Here is a view of the Sanmon from the ground
In the afternoon, I made it to Heian Jingu (Heian Shrine). It was built in 1895 to commemorate the 1100th anniversary of the founding of Kyoto as the capital. Two emperors are enshrined here: Emperor Kammu, who founded Kyoto, and Emperor Komei, the last Emperor to reside in Kyoto.
The buildings of the shrine are scaled down replicas of the first Imperial Palace. It's bright and colorful, which was a nice change of pace from the antique look of most of Kyoto's temples (or it could just be that I like orange and I like shrines).
The courtyard	Dressed for success
One of the inner buidlings
After the Heian Shrine, I was beat. It was about 3:00 and I decided to take a break by stepping into the Kyoto Museum of Modern Art, which was right next to the shrine. After that, I made my way back to the train station and explored the station for the late afternoon.