Marian, being Marian

 Marian is awesome.  I think she enjoyed playing in the creek more than anything else on our trip.  She wanted me to take tons of pictures of her around the water.  It was so fun to see her really enjoying herself.  I may have taken more photos than strictly necessary, but it was delightful!

Trip with Marian: Nara

We left the hotel at 9am and drove  a little over an hour to the city of Nara.  We stopped at Nara Park.  It is a HUGE tourist park with a ton of different shrines and temples of all sizes.  The main attraction was the Todaiji Temple, which is the largest wooden building in the world and it houses (I think) the largest brass Buddha statue in the world.  We had several hours to roam the park and it was plenty of time to do that.  I got totally and absolutely lost.  There are tons of walking paths that criss cross, and lots of souvenir shops and lots of shrines and temples and the map was not very helpful.  Fortunately we had lots of time to get un lost.

The park is full of Sika deer.  Someone a long time ago decided these deer were messengers of the gods, so they are revered and plentiful and spoiled.  They sell little deer crackers to feed them and the deer are so well fed that sometimes they dont' find it worth the effort to come and get the food.  We enjoyed the deer and the farther you went into the park, the happier the deer were to eat from your hand.

This is the largest wooden structure in the world.  Are you impressed?!

Yep, getting our selfie in!

Marian was less than impressed.   But the building was huge!

This is the giant Buddha. It was incredibly hard to get a good photo because of the angles, so this was the best I got.

This was a considerable smaller statue right next to Buddha.  I liked it because it was more fun and easier to photograph!

There were a couple of these cool guys, but with the light coming from behind, it didn't make for great pictures.

Marian doing the heroic pose.

Just a random shrine by the path.

I found a deer!  She's looking for a snack.

I have no idea what these are but there were lines and lines of them.  Pretty cool.

More random shrines along the path.....

Marian with the deer. She had fun.

I wanted to show how many deer there were roaming around.  A lot!

With a cool tree stump like this, a photo is a must! 

And then we had to do this.

With all the deer how could we not take a bunch of deer shots?!  They were just so cute!  

And hey, deer!

I think this was temple dedicated to relationships.  I forgot the name.  It was really pretty though.

I was feeling artsy.

And the long rows of lanterns were so impressive.

Hello, deer!

This was interesting.  I saw this guy in an attitude of prayer and surreptitiously zoomed the camera in for a shot.  As I was putting my camera away, he stood upright and pulled out a camera and took a picture!

We stopped at an Udon Noodle shop for lunch.  Marian really likes it but I'm less impressed.  I'm more a yakisoba kind of girl.

Hey, look!  More deer!

My new best friend.

They were guarding this torii.

And.... BEST sign ever!

On the 6 hour bus ride home, we stopped for dinner.  Marian decided to sample this.  Yep, octopus tentacle.  It was hard to get a little bite- very chewy.  But she gave it her best and tried it!

Trip with Marian: Kyoto

My friend asked if I wanted to go on a weekend trip with her, and I thought it would be fun.  We signed up and paid for it 2 months in advance, before I had time to talk myself out of it.  Unfortunately, less than 48 hours before departure, my friend couldn't go.  No worries, I took my favorite traveling companion and we had a great time!  It was a tour guided trip to Kyoto and Nara.  All I had to do was sign my name and throw money at them and they took care of the rest.  Good deal!

We left at 7 am Saturday morning (and returned at 10pm Sunday evening).  It was a 6 hour ride on the bus.  The rest stops on the expressway are awesome!  We had a potty stop and then an hour lunch break.  Then we got to Kyoto and stopped at the Ryoanji Zen Temple to see a famous rock garden that has been exactly the same for nearly 500 years.  Yeah, I didn't find it that thrilling.

Next it was off to the impressive Golden Pavilion.  It was crazy packed with tourists because it was a Japanese holiday and this is one of the biggest tourist attractions in Japan.  It was pretty cool. Then it was on to the hotel.  There was a night tour, but Marian was not interested.  We wandered around the few blocks near our hotel and got some dinner and called it an early night.

Chicken for lunch, yes please!

Best rest stop food ever!

The grounds around the Zen temple were gorgeous.

Marian was happy to pose for me.

Sad, but the only photo I took of the Zen Rock Garden was this.  I had brought my niece Charlotte's "Flat Stanley" doll with us and this is the only picture I got with this famous site!

The inside rooms had some lovely paintings on the walls.... but you can't see them in the picture.  I was impressed though.

The architecture was neat.

And turtles!  Who doesn't love Turtles?!

Oooh, pretty!

This is the Golden Pavilion.  It was initially a castle, but became a temple after the death of the guy who commissioned it (the third Ashikaga shogun, if that means anything to you!).  It was built in 1397.  

So enthusiastic!

There we go!  We are having fun!

Or maybe not?  I love this kid's deadpan face.  She'll say, "Take my picture."  and give me this face.

I did like this place, but it was jam packed with tourists an you had to just ride along with the crowd.  I was pleased with the pictures we got, since we were mostly in motion the whole time!

Vending machine ice cream is awesome!

I loved this picture.  The 3 ladies in kimonos going one direction and the man and woman in kimonos coming towards us.  The lady is checking out the 3 kimono-clad other ladies.

The fabulous view outside our downtown Kyoto hotel room on the 4th floor.

Breakfast was included and this was our favorite stuff:  Marian LOVED the chocolate croissants and I loved the little pork dumplings. Yummy!

Posing with her delicious croissant.

We took the "Western Style" buffet breakfast. This was the option we passed on!