Temples and Near by areas visit.

Today we went to a lot of temples and holy places where a lot of locals would go and worship and pray. The first one that we went to was the Sanju Sangendo a Buddhist temple consistning of 1000 bronze statues. The temple was a very quite because it is still a place for people who worship the buddha. The temple is still in use but they also allow other people to visit and have a look inside.
Outside the temple were some souvenir counters for people who wish to buy greetings or charms for friends and family, some of which may be very useful to us. After visiting this fairly decent temple we went to the very popular and well known kiyomizu temple. This temple was very big and is located at the top of a mountain, which greeted us with an amazing view over the city Kyoto. On the way up the hill there were some very unique stores selling very traditional japanese items including katanas and shirikens.

At lunch we had a buffet at the handicraft centre where they had some very delicate and detailed models and lots of kimonos for sale. As well as the two structures we also went to the Nijo castle and the kinkakuji cottage. The castle was a shogun castle where it was built so it could look over for the city. It has a very special anti bugler system made into the floors in the castle so it could detect any unwanted guests and criminals. The cottage is where the shoguns would go for a summer break and spend time relaxing and spend time with their families.

Shrine

Today we visited a shrine. The journey there was very long but was well worth it. It was said the entrance of the shrine is the biggest wooden structure in the world! Some very interesting facts. The area around the shrine consisted of 1095 deers and god they were hungry, chasing after us while holding the food. They were very impatient and were very desperate...............=.=. Many people had trouble walking around the park as there were just too many deers. The shrine was very big indeed and had 2 big statues beside gate.

Japanese primary school visit

Today was another phenomenal day as we got a chance to interact with some students from the country . The experience was better than expected, even though none of the children didn't really know how to speak english we still had a fun time together. We gave them gifts as greetings from our school and were hoping to get some back as well but to our surprise we got nothing!:(. But none the less we still had an amazing experience as we taught them a song and in exchange they taught us how to play the traditional drums. As well as that we also got treated to a nice half day at the spa world. This complex consists of many things like the asian and european hot tubs which we are high restricted not to go to and the water park where there were tones of rides to enjoy our free time with. we also had dinner there but the food was

Kyoto station

Today was also a very exciting and jam packed day as we had a lot more to do than yesterday. We explored the city in more depth today as we saw a lot of Kyoto's architect as well as the daily movement of people around the city. Lunch was also very good, as the quality of the sushi had a very high standard. One of the places we visited  station feature some very simple but cyber architect but doesn't overwhelm the mind. The day was very relaxed and not rushed.

Sushi for lunch! YUM YUM!

Kyoto train station

The Hotel tower! Looks funny

The sky bridge and very long escalator.

Landing in Kyoto

Today was a very rushed and hectic day for all of us. We woke up very early to get on an early flight so we can have full advantage of the remaining day but not much was done except for dinner and some down time for everyone. The dinner was some famous rice bowls especially this one, the beef bowl!

                                                           Beef bowl I had for dinner