Day 2 in Kyoto

Got up yesterday morning. Lisa and I sat around the apartment until about 10 Am and then left for our "temple hopping" day. It was a beautiful day, chilly but bright sunshine. No wind at all so that was great. I can now understand why people come here. There are very, very old temples everywhere. I was beginning to wonder yesterday if everybody lived in a temple many hundreds of years ago when these were built. The construction of the temples is just amazing. We did ALOT of walking yesterday. First temple we went to was also seen most recently in Lost in Translation (the Bill Murray movie). Lisa took lots of pics so she can help me post several later. A few observations at this first temple: no grass on the ground anywhere to be found, only moss. I have yet to see any grass anywhere. we went on a long walk through town yesterday beside a water aquaduct called the Philosopher's Walk and not a blade of grass anywhere. Don't know why. We saw a group of older Japanese ladies dressed in traditional clothing at the first temple. a picture of them will follow. We took several buses yesterday and several subways to get around. The public transportation system is fantastic. Lisa's Lonely Planet book always gave us information which bus to take, etc. The second temple was called the Golden Pavilion. This is a World Heritage Organization site. The only other WHO sites i have seen were in Australia. The grounds here were beautiful with lots of ponds and walking trails. We left here and went to a little diner for a very late lunch and then went on to our final Shinto shrine where you get a view of Kyoto (it is very elevated up on a hill) at dusk. Also lots of shopping on the streets leading up the hill to the Shrine. Once again, more pictures to follow courtesy of Lisa. After the shrine closed, we went back down the hill to catch the bus back to Kyoto. Not realizing that at 6:30 PM the buses were overloaded, we waiting through 3 buses and finally walked back to the subway station to get back to Lisa's neighborhood. We grabbed a coffee and a dessert for our dinner and were home by 7 PM. I was in bed by 9 PM and lisa stayed up and watched a movie with her roomie, Audrey and a neighbor from down the hall who is also a NOVA teacher, the "other" Lisa. a great but very tiring day from all the walking.