It's still quite early for plum blossoms, but having apparently been quite confused, I went to the Kitano Tenmangu Shrine (北野天満宮) today expecting them to be in their prime. Most trees were still bare, but there were still ample blossoms to be found here and there.

I seem to have bad luck with this temple... my first visit five years ago resulted in a blog post titled "Late to the Party: Plum Blossoms at the Kitano Tenmangu Shrine", where I talk about how past their prime they were.

Then the next year I stopped by in January expecting to find [...]

Last autumn I finally made my first visit to the sprawling mountainside Shugakuin Imperial Villa in north-east Kyoto. It's one of three imperial (connected with the Emperor of Japan) sites in Kyoto that you can visit via reservation, but reservations can be difficult to come by. For example, other than a few time slots next month, every online reservation slot is already full through the end of May.

However, foreigners can stop by the Imperial Household Agency office (on the grounds of the imperial-palace park, here) to pick up a near-term reservation if any have opened up. If you're lucky [...]

Picking up from part 1 and part 2 about my trip to the Housen-in Temple (宝泉院) in the Ohara mountain district of Kyoto last fall, we moved from the temple and its maple/moss garden, to a separate rock garden...

The weather alternated between light rain and brilliant sun... the gloominess seen above was suddenly replaced by intense sun, which lit up the moss and leaves near this gnarled (overly pruned) bush....

The tsukubai (water basin for ritual purification) is a particular focus point in this garden of many focus points...

It's a bit too much for my taste when viewed [...]

Picking up from "First Visit to Kyoto’s Housen-in Temple" the other day, where I ended with having tea and sweets in the garden-viewing room, here are some more shots of that room and the area.

The back of the room had some nice paintings in the alcoves...

In the shot above, Paul is facing the window seen in the opening shot, shooting the detail of the translucent opening above it. It's covered with thick Japanese paper, so he probably got a shot like this:

The full window looked like it should be very photogenic, but despite spending considerable effort on [...]

Dipping back into my largely-untapped archive from November's many fall-foliage outings, here are some photos from a trip to the Kyoto mountain-suburb of Ohara, where we (Damien Douxchamps, Paul Barr, and I) visited some of the smaller temples surrounding the justly-famous Sanzen-in temple (三千院), which has been on my blog many times since my first visit four years ago, including the bazillion offering statues and one of my all-time favorite photos, "Serenity".

But on this trip a few months ago, we avoided the oppressive crowds at Sanzen-in, instead letting Damien introduce us to the hidden-gem lesser temples dotting its perimeter.