I had a fantastic experience on Friday, part of which included making tofu from scratch with an 80-year-old lady in her old farmhouse in northern Shiga prefecture, about an hour from Kyoto.

She's five-foot-nothing of pure grandmotherly warmth, but was a bit shy of the camera, so my photos of her don't really reflect her incessant beaming smile. I was there as a photographer on behalf of Tour du Lac Biwa, a tour company that arranges off-the-beaten-path "experience" tours in Shiga prefecture, for English-speaking visitors. It's the same tour company that I appeared on TV for, and that arranged this [...]

I spent a few hours today in the Murin'an Garden (無鄰菴) in eastern Kyoto, doing a photoshoot with Ting Ting, which you might remember from "Photoshoot at the Peak of the Haradanien Garden’s Awesomeness" two days ago.

Like two days ago, I was with Eric, Gigi, and Damien, but this time Gigi was behind her own camera as well...

I really enjoyed the situation with three photographers and one subject. While someone else is directing Ting Ting to look this way or move that way, I can capture pseudo-candid shots that I'd probably not get otherwise.

For example, early on [...]

I visited the super-duper unbelievably amazing Haradanien Garden (原谷苑) today, in the mountains above the Golden Pavilion temple in northwestern Kyoto. It was my first visit since the photoshoot with John and Ai two years ago.

This time I went with Eric, Gigi, and Damien just to practice portraiture. Gigi wore a kimono she bought yesterday.

I can not begin to tell you how wonderful Haradanien is. When the blossoms are at their peak, such as now, it's 100× better than any other garden I know of, anywhere.

金閣寺の近く、原谷苑、は今メチャメチャメチャ美しいです。 行きにくい所ですが、今週はおすすめです。今日は全然満開でした！

I wanted a different kind of shot of Gigi than [...]

One day of rain changes everything with the cherry-blossom petals. It was lovely yesterday with trees full of blossoms, but today's rain knocked many of them off.

A few days ago, the area seen above looked like this:

Not all areas/trees are affected the same... I think it depends strongly on where each specific tree is in its blooming cycle. Another cherry tree not far away seems unaffected by the rain...

Some varieties of cherry haven't even started to bloom yet, so there's still much awaiting those arriving in Kyoto today (such as Gigi and Eric; Gigi arrived today to [...]

After a day of uneventful flying, we've ended our month-long RV trip across the US and now we're back in Kyoto.

ただいま！京都に戻りました。

Now comes the daunting task of unpacking, processing my photos, checking a month's worth of email, dealing with a month's worth of blog comments about my plugins, and doing my US taxes. If I can complete all this, I'll need a vacation!