Kyoto in May

I’ve had a hard time deciding which photos to post as there are loads of picture-postcard places in Kyoto. Gardens, temples, castles and shrines abound in this ancient city that was once the imperial capital of Japan. In fact the Kyoto area has the distinction of having 17 UNESCO World Heritage sites and 14 of these are within the city limits! Beyond that there are 1,600 temples, 400 shrines and more gardens than anyone can count. When inside one of these gardens it is easy to forget that Kyoto is also a modern city of 1.5 million people with excellent infrastructure and the ultramodern Cube shopping mall, not to mention the new Manga Museum.

We visited several of the most famous sites: the Imperial Palace, the Shogun’s Castle, a golden temple. Our best experiences were more unexpected discoveries: a smaller temple and garden off the beaten track unmentioned in guidebooks, a canal in the older part of the city where one could see a blue heron, the quiet  Philosopher’s Path stumbled upon after visit to a very beautiful, but very crowded temple. 

This slideshow requires JavaScript.