Touristy things

I'm finally back at the compute after being away nearly a week.  Takumi was here for two days... then Tetsu and I drove to a northern prefecture for three days to visit friends and do some grave site repair.  The drive is 6 hours each way so we were pretty wiped out last night when we finally arrived home.  (Let's say Tetsu was pretty wiped out.  He did all the driving!

So backing up a bit...  Takumi and Julieta-san and her brother Augustin arrived in Japan Tuesday afternoon and took the train up to Utsunomiya where we met them and brought them back to Nikko with us.  It was the first time for Julieta-san and her brother to visit Japan but they were willing to try and eat and do anything!

Dinner that night was a buffet style restaurant where they could chose whatever they liked to eat.

Tetsu took Wednesday off and we all piled into our little car and headed up to the shrine and temple areas of Nikko.

 Nippon is a formal, maybe even archaic way of referring to the country, Japan. 

This large temple, the Rinnoji Temple, is being renovated for 12 years and though the beautiful temple can't be observed, there was a sightseeing area set aside so that tourists could view the whole renovation process. 

We climbed up 7 stories to where the roof was being worked on...  These are the under shingles before the roof's true copper plating is applied. 

Someone cleverly spotted a fund raising opportunity of "selling" shingles that would be used in the roof (of course not visible after the final plating)  That's one way to have your name preserved for a few more hundred years!  (We declined the opportunity).

 A five story pagoda on the grounds.

 Walking between shrine and temple.

 Julieta-san is so cute.

At a charm booth where one could purchase good luck charms for academic excellence, a long lasting love relationship, protection from traffic accidents etc.

The Shinkyo bridge (Sacred Bridge) of Nikko is a favorite tourist spot.

All in the same area are the Toshogu Shrine (Shinto) Futara Temple (Buddhist) and the Rinnoji Temple (Buddhist again).  It is somewhat confusing to foreigners how these religions can be intertwined but the tall cedar trees, the mossy cobblestones and the snow topped mountains all lend themselves to the sacred atmosphere.

Tetsu and I sat out the visit to the Toshogu Shrine and we ate Japanese sweets while the three young people hiked into the burial grounds and checked out the See No Evil, Hear No Evil, Speak No Evil monkey carvings and the Sleeping Cat carving.

Our next jaunt of this trip was further up the mountain to the lake area....

More tomorrow.