Today was a wonderfully busy day! We covered 4 whole temples in Kyoto in the span of about 6 hours, and I still can’t believe we managed to see them all. 

The first temple we visited was Kinkaku-ji Golden Pavilion, a building constructed by a Shogun as a way to showcase their wealth and influence. Each story of the building is meant to represent a certain class level, starting at the bottom with Emperor, followed by the second level that represents Samurai, and finally the first level which represents Buddhism or the Buddha themselves. The temple itself was beautiful, surrounded by a large pond and gardens, and having gold leaf completely coat the top two levels! There were a lot of people and it got very crowded, but the serenity of the nature surrounding the temple made it worth it. 

Afterwards, we sped on over to Tenryu-ji temple in Kyoto’s Arashiyama district, a Buddhist temple site thats consists of one main temple surrounded by numerous other smaller sub-temples and gardens. This temple was one of my favorites, as the large amount of gardens created such nice scenery and really brought into perspective the beauty of nature. The bamboo forest within the temple grounds was breathtaking as well, and the shoots were so tall they seemed to reach towards the sky. The path we followed culminated in a wonderful view of the nearby mountains and a river, which created an environment that I used to only see in books or online. This temple was truly an amazing experience, and probably my favorite of the four we visited!

After Tenryu-ji, we spent an hour in Arashiyama and tried some of the local food there! I got some kokoroge, which is a croquet with different types of filling, as well as my first bowl of ramen in Japan, both of which were delcious! I also managed to find some matcha ice cream soft serve before we boarded our tour bus again, and while it was tasty, the green match powder also got all over my shirt!

Our third temple of the day was Kiyomizu-dera in eastern Kyoto, an extremely popular temple famous for its views and wooden platform that rests high above the ground. The view from the platform was amazing, and I could see for miles! A nice old man who was Japanese even came up to me and Megan and offered to take our picture for us, and complimented our Japanese 😀 I was also able to buy a stamp book, one as a souvenir and one to hopefully fill up with my temple stamps!

Our fourth and final temple of the day was the Fushimi Inari Shrine, a Shinto shrine that’s known for its iconic red Tori gates (over 1,000 of them!) I was able to try praying at the shrine, and walk through some of the many gates! It really made me feel connected to and gave perspective on Japanese spirituality, and is an experience I’ll remember for a long while. 

Our day then began to wrap up with a movie screening of Demon Slayer: Mugen Train, which was really interesting as I had never watched Demon Slayer before. The animation was great, and I still had some wet eyes towards the end despite not really knowing any of the characters beforehand. After finshing the movie and grabbing a last minute dinner at the food court in a nearby mall, our group finally headed back to our hotel and turned in for the night, bringing another busy and fruitful day to a close.