Our first day trip! I think we were all super excited about visiting Kyoto! The only downer was the grey, rainy weather. By 9 we had all boarded our rental bus and took off to our 1 hour ride. Tao tried to console us about having a rainy first trip saying that most of Winter School's trips to Kyoto had been rainy... T_T
HY (sitting next to me) immediately fell asleep so I started practicing napping too.
1 hour later we arrived in Kyoto and as we were driving by old buildings and seeing lots of people in Kimonos I slowly started falling in love with this city and quietly decided to visit again some day. =3
After getting off at the Kinkakuji (金閣寺) or Rokuonji (鹿苑寺) as it is officially called and getting our tickets, we entered the garden and took tons of photos at the first scenic spot.
The Kinkakuji in all it's beauty and my favorite pastime: Taking photos of people taking photos. ^^
Afterwards we were free to walk around the beautiful garden (I'd really love to see this place in Spring)
I'm a sucker for nicely decorated roofs XD
While driving through Kyoto's main streets (so beautiful T_T ) we saw many dressed-up young people and were told that it was Coming of Age Day (成人の日).
It was very beautiful to look at so many young women in Furisode (振袖) some kind of formal long-sleeved kimono walking elegantly down the rainy streets and meeting up with guys in suits. kk
Our next stop was Yasaka-Jinja (八坂神社) and Gion (祇園). Please wait for my next entry ~