Spring and Fall are Kyoto's glorious seasons, and although this season's foilage is said to be weak, it seems that I'm getting loads of great pictures every time I go out (and am going out a lot, since it's so nice and there are so many wonderful places close by).

I'd posted many nice photos when I wrote about our summer trip to Ryouanji. Ryouanji (龍安寺 -- the Ryouan Temple) is a small temple tucked in near the mountains in the north-west part of Kyoto, near its more famous tourist-spot brother, Kinkakuji (金閣寺 -- the Golden Pavilion).

A [...]

It's fall in Kyoto and that means lots of little trips to see the magnificent foliage. Anthony and I took a long walk last week with Katsunori Shimada, my good friend of 10+ years. We went to the Kyoto Biwako Canal Museum (about the canal built in the 1880s that brought water and Japan's first electricity to Kyoto), then up the Kyoto Incline and into the mountains and temples and paths back behind it. (Five pages of pictures here.)

Our day was mostly uncrowded until during our return we descended from the mountains into the rear corner of [...]

This past Sunday was a big day for us, as we had the fourth and final interview at the preschool we were interested in, which is highly regarded for many reasons, and only about 10% of applicants actually get in. (We found out yesterday that Anthony was accepted!)

After the interview, Anthony and I took a little bike ride to see some fall foliage. It's pretty anemic this year, but we were still able to find some nice areas close by. We first went to a secluded area in the south part of the old imperial palace [...]

The leaves are finally getting into the Fall spirit here in Kyoto, which got me thinking about the above photo which I took mid-October two years ago, in Ohio. I haven't really found a place like that within walking distance of my place here.

I rather like the shot, and it got me thinking of some amazing nature shots I saw when I first released my image viewer earlier this year. Here are some of those photos:

[ UPDATE: all the photos that were linked here are no longer available at their respective sites, but click on [...]