Nara Part 1

Nara is the home of several of Japans Word heritage sites, amongst these, the biggest Buddah statue in the world.

We made no plans for Nara, other than to take the train to the station, and make our way up to Nara Koen from there. Geir decided he wanted to do a guided tour from the Hotel in Kyoto, so if you're missing him in the pictures, that's the reason why =)

When we got to Nara, we were offered guided tours. At the hotel, they charged 13000 yen, and they wanted a couple thousand the ones offering at the train station.

Sensei-Oddemann went to the information desk to ask about Nara, and the little old lady behind the counter started asking questions about our shirts. One thing led to another, and after discovering we were Karate-ka from Norway, she told us that the local YMCA offered a guided tour of Nara for three hours, for FREE! We accepted, got a map and instructions to go to the other tourist information center in town, and ask for Hideko-San.

The lovely lady at the tourist center!

We med a super friendly lady, and she showed us her planned route, and off we went for a walk =)

Nara is very focused on its deer! They are quite tame, and will literally eat out of your hand. Hideko even brought some frozen citrus peel for us too feed to the deer.

A nice note about the deer is that they bow to you if they want treats. You bow back, and give them biscuits. (Sold all over the park) - The deer are also quite willing to accept petting and scratching.Do, however, choose your deer with caution, as some bite you in the arm or tummy if they feel like it!

Hideko-San, Sensei, Makiwara-San and Kawaii-San

FEED ME!

Sensei and some deer!

The park houses several shrines, and holy sites. Japan has both Shinto (for happy occations) and Buddhism (for other occations). The two mix peacefully, but some rituals are different. The cleansing ritual is quite interesting, and consists of washing your hands, mouth and the cup used for the ritual.

The famous five storied pagoda.

A deer that's dear to our dearest Kawaii-San

All the pagodas, shrines and other buildings where beautiful, but we did not realize that we were in for a huge treat.  An absolutely breathtaking and SPECTACULAR sight was too meet us just past a pair of ornament gates!

Tōdai-ji temple, home to the great Buddah!

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The entire construction is literally breathtaking. As mentioned, the grandeur of the site cannot be justified by words and pictures. The building itself is stunning, and the presence of the Buddah statue is tangible.

On a fun note, there is a special, secret underground passageway to the old palace from the temple building. This passageway is illustrated by a hole in a pillar inside, which visitors are encouraged to crawl through. Kawaii-San and Kuma-San took the challenge. The rest of us were clearly too large.

Random tourist climbing through. Yours truly was too busy helping Kuma-San through to actually taske photos with my own camera!

After leaving the temple area, the tour was supposed to end, but our fantastic guide had something up her sleeve, and told us that she wanted to show us "just one more thing".....

/Kristian