• Menu
  • Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

Before Header

  • About Us
  • Lexicon
  • Contact Us
  • Our Store
  • ↑
  • ↓
  • ←
  • →

Balloon Juice

Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

My right to basic bodily autonomy is not on the table. that’s the new deal.

Shallow, uninformed, and lacking identity

Hell hath no fury like a farmer bankrupted.

Wow, you are pre-disappointed. How surprising.

Tick tock motherfuckers!

When you’re in more danger from the IDF than from Russian shelling, that’s really bad.

All hail the time of the bunny!

But frankly mr. cole, I’ll be happier when you get back to telling us to go fuck ourselves.

Washington Post Catch and Kill, not noticeably better than the Enquirer’s.

Following reporting rules is only for the little people, apparently.

The media handbook says “controversial” is the most negative description that can be used for a Republican.

Is it irresponsible to speculate? It is irresponsible not to.

SCOTUS: It’s not “bribery” unless it comes from the Bribery region of France. Otherwise, it’s merely “sparkling malfeasance”.

🎶 Those boots were made for mockin’ 🎵

This has so much WTF written all over it that it is hard to comprehend.

the 10% who apparently lack object permanence

The arc of history bends toward the same old fuckery.

Stamping your little feets and demanding that they see how important you are? Not working anymore.

Dumb motherfuckers cannot understand a consequence that most 4 year olds have fully sorted out.

The line between political reporting and fan fiction continues to blur.

People are weird.

Let’s not be the monsters we hate.

“In this country American means white. everybody else has to hyphenate.”

Republicans don’t want a speaker to lead them; they want a hostage.

Mobile Menu

  • Seattle Meet-up Post
  • 2025 Activism
  • Targeted Political Fundraising
  • Donate with Venmo, Zelle & PayPal
  • Site Feedback
  • War in Ukraine
  • Submit Photos to On the Road
  • Politics
  • On The Road
  • Open Threads
  • Topics
  • COVID-19
  • Authors
  • About Us
  • Contact Us
  • Lexicon
  • Our Store
  • Politics
  • Open Threads
  • 2025 Activism
  • Garden Chats
  • On The Road
  • Targeted Fundraising!
You are here: Home / Photo Blogging / On The Road / On The Road – Pharniel – Kyoto In Fall

On The Road – Pharniel – Kyoto In Fall

by WaterGirl|  November 20, 20205:00 am| 16 Comments

This post is in: On The Road, Photo Blogging

FacebookTweetEmail

On the Road is a weekday feature spotlighting reader photo submissions.

From the exotic to the familiar, whether you’re traveling or in your own backyard, we would love to see the world through your eyes.

Submit Your Photos

Pharniel

Back in 2019 my spouse and I crossed off a bucketlist entry and went to Japan.

We spent two and a half weeks and hit most of the ‘big’ cities. We timed our trip to hit peak foliage and it did not disappoint.

For those wondering how Big A Deal fall in Kyoto is – there are signs at the train station letting you know which temples are at what level of peakness and…whoa. Mindblowing what a few hundred years to shape a garden can do.

While Osaka was more our speed, Kyoto is a big sleepy town. It’s also laid out in a sensible manner which really helps when getting around.

This batch will be various temples in Kyoto in fall. I’ve got pictures of when we climbed up a monkey mountain, but that really deserves its own entry.

These are all daylight shots, I’m saving the night time for the next submission because shooting at night, on a cell phone, in shoulder to shoulder crowds was a significant challenge.

On The Road - Pharniel - Kyoto In Fall 7
Tokufuji Temple, Kyoto JapanNovember 26, 2019

A slight hill gives a shot of the gardens, and just how well they are planned. Also how crowded things were.

One of the most famous temples in Kyoto, Tokufuji has its own subway stop. The trick, according to the travel guide, is to circle the temple from the outside, then work your way in.

On The Road - Pharniel - Kyoto In Fall 6
Tokufuji Temple, Kyoto JapanNovember 26, 2019

Part of why we trusted the travel guide.

The sea of trees you can see here is amazing, and the bridge is in the Temple proper, this is another bridge that overlooks it all.

Entrance to most temples isn’t free, and can be quite expensive.

Rates ran 500 to 1,000 yen for daytime admission, and night shows could get up to 2,000 yen a person.

On The Road - Pharniel - Kyoto In Fall 5
Ryoan-Ji Temple, Kyoto November 26, 2019

This is a picture of the oldest zen garden in Kyoto, if not the oldest surviving period.
The walls were made of clay infused with oil and over hundreds of years the oil has seeped out, staining the walls.

This was super peaceful, if also crowded. Less visually arresting than the other gardens, it was still very impressive.

On The Road - Pharniel - Kyoto In Fall 4
Kyoto Railway Museum November 26, 2019

A shot of the roundhouse in the back yard.
Just…I can’t emphasize how awesome this museum is.

Just lots of full size trains, and plenty of guides.
I’m used to Greenfield Village and the Ford’s obsession with trains, and this blows it all away.

 

On The Road - Pharniel - Kyoto In Fall 3
Honen-In Temple November 25, 2019

Not my best composition, but it suits the sculpted chaos that is the average temple garden.

On The Road - Pharniel - Kyoto In Fall 2
Nanzenji Fukuchicho Temple, Kyoto November 25, 2019

For some reason (plenty of reasons, but better expressed here) the Nanzenji Fukuchicho temple has a Roman-style aqueduct. A fully functional, currently in use, aqueduct. That you can climb on top of.

It’s quite beautiful.

On The Road - Pharniel - Kyoto In Fall 1
Tenryuji Temple, Kyoto November 24, 2019

Just a shot of the nifty little streams all over the garden.

There’s just details like this nestled in every corner. Easy to get lost and, well, that’s sort of the point.

On The Road - Pharniel - Kyoto In Fall
Ten Ryuji Temple, Kyoto November 24, 2019

I took hundreds of photos, and this is the only one that even comes close to capturing the scale, detail, and beauty of the temple gardens.

You can see the reflection in the pool, the use of mounds behind to give the appearance of unified mountains, and the variety and color in the trees.

 

FacebookTweetEmail
Previous Post: « COVID-19 Coronavirus Updates: Thursday/Friday, Nov. 19-20
Next Post: Friday Morning Open Thread: President-Elected Biden Continues To Impress »

Reader Interactions

16Comments

  1. 1.

    KSinMA

    November 20, 2020 at 6:33 am

    Beautiful!

  2. 2.

    JeanneT

    November 20, 2020 at 7:14 am

    Thank you for sharing these shots.  That must have been an outstanding trip!

  3. 3.

    p.a.

    November 20, 2020 at 7:19 am

    Wow!  Tks.

  4. 4.

    MazeDancer

    November 20, 2020 at 7:28 am

    Gorgeous pictures!

  5. 5.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    November 20, 2020 at 7:33 am

    Those pictures are so beautiful, they don’t look real.

  6. 6.

    arrieve

    November 20, 2020 at 7:49 am

    Just wonderful colors. I kind of missed fall sitting in my apartment so I’m grateful for the vicarious experience.

  7. 7.

    randy khan

    November 20, 2020 at 8:15 am

    We only got to one temple when we were in Kyoto, and the gardens were marvelous.  These photos make me want to go back for more.  (Well, I wanted to go back already, but you know what I mean.)

  8. 8.

    J R in WV

    November 20, 2020 at 8:28 am

    Great work building and fostering those gardens. The trees have been sculpted as if they were bonsai, only they’re nearly full sized.

    I’m sure you were frustrated trying to shoot such an all encompassing experience — it can’t be done with a camera, solo. Perhaps with a crew and hi-def video cameras moving very, very slowly, creating hours of imagery.

    But you have done a great job with your still camera, composing the photos, selecting the best photos from the hundreds you had. Just picking out the favorites at home after the trip is a terrifically hard job.

    Thanks again for sharing. The aqueduct is a great oddity. I’ll look that up when I get back home — I’m doing my final supplies trip now, to hold us til next year if at all possible.

  9. 9.

    TheronWare

    November 20, 2020 at 9:06 am

    I remember riding on a subway train in Tokyo and the seats were velvet covered!

  10. 10.

    JanieM

    November 20, 2020 at 9:18 am

    Beautiful, wow. I could sit and look at the first one all day long. Plus I love the phrase “sculpted chaos.”

  11. 11.

    JanieM

    November 20, 2020 at 9:41 am

    Sorry mods, I mistyped my email address so I have a comment in moderation. Should have tea before typing, and/or get a new keyboard.

  12. 12.

    Princess

    November 20, 2020 at 9:58 am

    Beautiful. Thank you. Making it back to Japan is a top priority.

  13. 13.

    Miss Bianca

    November 20, 2020 at 12:34 pm

    @JanieM: Me too! Maybe “sculpted chaos” will be my new band name!

    I love your Maine photos, too. Making me terribly nostalgic.

  14. 14.

    dm

    November 20, 2020 at 1:22 pm

    That aqueduct at Nanzenji has a fantastic story behind it.

    When the Emperor moved the court to Edo (Tokyo) in the middle of the nineteenth century, the mayor and town council of Kyoto were staring at economic collapse, since the city economy was based on supplying the Emperor’s court and attendants (this is why there are candy shops in Kyoto that date to the 16th century).

    They hit upon a plan to bore a tunnel through the mountains to Lake Biwa, a large fresh water lake in central Honshu, which was a major route for shipping commerce.  The tunnel would carry boats, which would carry the commerce to Kyoto, and thence to the sea.  The ready access to goods meant Kyoto could shift its economic focus and remain a thriving city.

    The task of building the tunnel fell upon a young engineering student (I think he was 23 when he started).  He pulled it off, complete with building factories to make bricks (new to Japan at the time) to line the tunnels, and even building a hydroelectric plant since the Kyoto end of the tunnel is about 100 feet above the river, enough head to run some generators.  There’s a tramway that carries canal boats the final leg down the hill to the river.

    The aqueduct is an offshoot of the canal, providing fresh water for the city.  After, the British Society of Civil Engineers gave him an award.

  15. 15.

    JanieM

    November 20, 2020 at 1:23 pm

    @Miss Bianca: Thanks. There should be a few more Maine pics coming up next week.

  16. 16.

    Captain C

    November 20, 2020 at 2:04 pm

    These are lovely photos.  I’m glad you made it to the Railway Museum; it’s truly magnificent.

Comments are closed.

Primary Sidebar

On The Road - beckya57 - Copper Canyon, Mexico, April 2025 6
Image by beckya57 (6/19/25)

Recent Comments

  • cmorenc on AM in NC – NO KINGS – Durham, NC (with the Durham images this time!) (Jun 19, 2025 @ 2:46pm)
  • Geminid on Simon Rosenberg Sees Emerging Opportunity, and I Make Some Lists (Jun 19, 2025 @ 2:46pm)
  • WTFGhost on Thursday Morning Open Thread: Juneteenth (Jun 19, 2025 @ 2:42pm)
  • Another Scott on Simon Rosenberg Sees Emerging Opportunity, and I Make Some Lists (Jun 19, 2025 @ 2:40pm)
  • Harrison Wesley on Simon Rosenberg Sees Emerging Opportunity, and I Make Some Lists (Jun 19, 2025 @ 2:39pm)

Personality Crisis Podcast (Cole, DougJ, mistermix)

Balloon Juice Posts

View by Topic
View by Author
View by Month & Year
View by Past Author

Featuring

Medium Cool
Artists in Our Midst
Authors in Our Midst
No Kings Protests June 14 2025

🎈Keep Balloon Juice Ad Free

Become a Balloon Juice Patreon
Donate with Venmo, Zelle or PayPal

Calling All Jackals

Site Feedback
Nominate a Rotating Tag
Submit Photos to On the Road
Balloon Juice Anniversary (All Links)
Balloon Juice Anniversary (All Posts)
Fix Nyms with Apostrophes

Social Media

Balloon Juice
WaterGirl
TaMara
John Cole
DougJ (aka NYT Pitchbot)
Betty Cracker
Tom Levenson
David Anderson
Major Major Major Major
DougJ NYT Pitchbot
mistermix

Keeping Track

Legal Challenges (Lawfare)
Republicans Fleeing Town Halls (TPM)
21 Letters (to Borrow or Steal)
Search Donations from a Brand

Site Footer

Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

  • Facebook
  • RSS
  • Twitter
  • YouTube
  • Comment Policy
  • Our Authors
  • Blogroll
  • Our Artists
  • Privacy Policy

Copyright © 2025 Dev Balloon Juice · All Rights Reserved · Powered by BizBudding Inc

Share this ArticleLike this article? Email it to a friend!

Email sent!