Japan -12

Hi, For our final port we returned to Aomori.

Musicians on the pier greeted the ship.

We first visited the Warasse Nebuta Museum.  The museum had numerous displays related to the Nebuta Festival which would begin that evening.

Key to the festival are floats, such as the one above.

Also, there was a display of masks, two of which are shown above and below.

Next we walked over to where preparations were being made for the evening's parade.  Above is one of the floats.  These are lit from the inside.

Drums also are an important part of the parade.  Here they are being tuned.

A short distance beyond where the preparations were underway groups of children were performing (above and two below).  I think this was just a practice session based on the lack of any costumes.

Our final visit for the trip was the Sannai Maruyama Archaeological Site .  There were many more structures of greater variety than we saw during our previous visit to a Jomon site (above and three below).

This is the interior (above) of the building below.  It is believed that long houses such as this served either as meeting halls or workshops.

Thanks for looking.

Japan - 11

Hi, In this post I will cover our visit to Kanazawa.  In the morning we visited Kenrokuen Gardens while in the afternoon we explored former Geisha quarters.

The photo above shows the entrance to the gardens while the nine photos below were taken as we walked through the gardens.

There is a moss plot in the gardens which is weeded by hand.

Rocks in the stream are brushed with brooms.

Here is another pattern I found intriguing.

After the men finished cleaning the rocks and left, the stream quieted to yield nice reflections.

Its amazing what the Japanese will do to support trees (above and two below).

Ropes are used to tie the supports together.

Kasumi Pond in the park has this interesting tea house

and a two legged lantern which is emblematic of the park.

Adjacent to the park is the Kanazawa Castle.

A beautiful lily pond was outside the castle walls.

Before lunch we strolled through a market.

The merchandise displays (above and below) were very interesting.

In particular we noted how carefully the produce is protected from bruising.

This market is not a tourist attraction but rather a place where the Japanese do their shopping (above and below).

That afternoon we visited the former Geisha district.

Here are some interior views of one of the houses (above and three below).  Note the instruments and how spare the decoration is.

Here is an exterior decoration.  Thanks for looking.

Japan - 10

Hi, Our visit to Kyoto involved walking through a Zen Buddhist Temple along with a Buddhist lunch followed by a visit to the Kyoto Museum of Traditional Arts in the late afternoon. The lack of a crowd and the really excellent vegetarian lunch were huge pluses this day. Unfortunately there was not time to visit the world heritage temples in Kyoto.

On leaving the port of Maizuru we spotted this sign from the bus.  We turned right toward Kyoto instead continuing straight toward Obama.

The road to Kyoto was a limited access expressway.  We stopped at a rest stop and were amazed at its size and the variety of merchandise for sale (above and below).

The photos above and 18 below were taken at the Daitoku-ji Temple.  It was an inspiring place photographically.

Our lunch began with the tray in this photo.

However, the waitresses kept bringing bowls; none with a lot of food but all in all a huge lunch.  The photo above shows all the bowls at the end of lunch.

Cicadas are highly revered in Japan. This one was sitting on a wall.

I thought this bamboo made an interesting pattern.

On our way to the Museum of Traditional Arts we crossed this river.

The museum had three people demonstrating their crafts, two of whom are shown above and below.

The museum also has many examples of traditional crafts on display (above and two below).

Spanning the street to the left of the museum is a huge Torii arch.

Musicians playing traditional music on traditional instruments and dressed in traditional costumes greeted us on our return to the ship.  Thanks for looking.