More Photos from Nara

Nara was such a beautiful place. I tell Maki that the Japanese excel at creating beautiful spaces. Even more, they are terrific at creating places where there are moving views from every angle. Check out these photos from one of the other temples in Nara Park.

The Deer of Nara

We had read about the deer of Nara prior to the trip. The deer are a national treasure and are not be harmed or scared. But we were still surprised to find the deer swarming the park, as tame as could be, even aggressive about approaching humans for food.

During our walk on our first night, Maki bought a sweet potato and CJ enjoyed feeding the skin and flesh to the deer. We also bought deer crackers that look to be made of rice that they seemed to really love.

We saw many does, a few bucks and a number of fawns. Many of the males had their horns clipped, presumably to keep them from fighting each other. We spotted one deer fight between two males and noticed that the males were considerably dirtier than the does.

Here's me and CJ feeding the deer sweet potatoes. 

CJ got swarmed by deer once they realized he had food. 

The deer got a little aggressive with CJ and he had to run away!

Hmmm... this camera strap looks interesting. 

We taught MJ to pet the deer nicely. At one point, he was petting a deer on the tush, the deer's butt would wiggle and MJ would shriek with laughter.

Todai-iji Temple and the Big Buddha

We ended up visiting Nara Park three times. When we arrived on Sunday afternoon, we took a quick walk to the park before dinner. We didn't see much because it was getting dark but we did see the big gate and a bunch of deer.

On Monday, we spent the day at the Park. We saw the big gate, the Todai-iji Temple, the daibutsuden that houses the big buddha, the big buddha and several other minor (but no less beautiful) temples. We had a yummy soba lunch at the park, after which Maki and I went back to the ryokan so MJ could nap while CJ peeled offed with his grandparents and visited more temples.

On Tuesday, we visited Nara Park again, this time with Alex and Christine who arrived around 9pm on Monday night.  We were incredibly lucky with the weather The sun was out, the sky was blue and it was sweater or light coat temperatures.

Here's the family in front of the big gate, with one of the ever present deer. 

Check out the blue sky. It was a gorgeous, perfect day! 

The daibutsuden that houses the big buddha 

 The large buddha is framed by other buddhas

Mj got to ring the gong.

CJ, Christine and I in front of the gate.

MJ just loved riding on Uncle Alex's shoulders.

Alex and MJ inside the gate. When crossing the gate, you are not supposed to step on the threshold. 

We donated 1000 yen to buy a tile for the daibutsuden roof. We got to the write a message.

Staying at the Ryokan Hakushikaso in Nara

When Maki, CJ and I visited Kyoto five years ago, we stayed in a ryokan, or Japanese guesthouse. Ryokan are a huge tradition in Japan. They are often beautiful wooden buildings, the rooms are made of wood and have tatami mats on the floor, and they serve traditional Japanese breakfasts and dinners that take advantage of local foods.

Like last time, I used JapaneseGuesthouses.com to book a ryokan in Nara. We spent two nights at the Ryokan Hakushikaso in Nara, which is located close to the temple complex and not far from the train station.

You can spend a lot of money staying at a ryokan but the Hakushikaso was well priced. Our stay included breakfast and dinner, the rooms were large and beautiful, and there was a public bath on the 2nd floor.

When we arrived at the ryokan, we asked for dinner to be served in Grandma and Grandpa Tak's room at 6:30, which meant we had about an hour and a half to walk around the see the town. So we headed to the temple complex and visited the large template gate. The highlight of the evening was the deer! Nara is home to many, many deer that are absolutely tame. In fact, it's illegal to harm them and they are considered national treasures. As we were walking to the temple gate, a sweet potato cart went past us. I love sweet potatoes so Maki bought me a roasted sweet potato. I thought it was for me but Maki's dad said no, the sweet potatoes are for the deer! So CJ, MJ and I broke off pieces of the skin and flesh to feed some deer we found in a little park. There must have been a dozen of them surrounding us, begging for food. The boys were squealing with delight as the deer nuzzled them and jostled each other to get food.

The breakfasts and dinner were amazing! There must have been 8 or 10 dishes at every meal and each meal was different from the others. We're told that Nara is known for its oysters, fish and persimmon.

On our first night, I took a bath in the public bath and it was incredible. First, you wash yourself and then sit in this beautiful, tiled bath that can fit maybe 10 people. The baths are same gender only and I shared my bath with two other women. 

The boys were up very early both mornings so we gave them some electronics time to keep them quiet until breakfast time. This is them around 5:30 in the morning.

Here is one of the breakfasts, which included: rice, miso soup, tofu, fish soup, bell peppers with miso paste, fish and fish sprinkles.

Here's dinner on our second night, which included: miso soup, somen noodles, lobster, beef, chicken, fish, rice, and pickles.

Taking the Train to Nara

On Sunday morning, we were up bright and early because of the jetlag. I was up at 4am and the boys were up by 5:30am. By 6:30am, we all got dressed and Maki took both boys to the local 7-Eleven for some yogurt, miso soup, rice balls and a natto roll for himself.

It's amazing how integral 7-Elevent is to Japanese life. 7-Elevens are everywhere and you can buy the craziest stuff in them: sushi rolls, rice balls filled with salted plum or salmon, all kinds of hot and cold teas, minor electronics, yada, yada. Whenever we're in Japan, I have a rice ball from 7-Eleven pretty much every day. And on this trip, I discovered lightly sweetened plain yogurt from Meiji Dairy that is to die for. As the name implies, it's not too sweet, it's got a tartness that is usually processed out of American yogurt and it's wonderfully creamy. Yum.

 Here's CJ holding up a natto roll, which Maki adores. CJ and I think natto is stinky.

After packing everything up, we caught a cab to Tokyo station. We met Maki's parents at 10:30 so we would have an hour to buy food for the train and then get on the shinkanesen. We got a bunch of yummy food, including all kinds of nigiri sushi, enari and chirashi sushi. The train was scheduled to leave at 11:30 and it did. You can set your clock by the trains, which run so efficiently.

Here we all are on the platform, waiting for the shinkansen to go to Kyoto.

Here's Maki with his awesome sushi lunch.

We took the shinkansen to Kyoto and then transferred to a local train to Nara. I guess Nara is not served by the shinkansen. We love the trains in Japan, but especially the shinkansen. When we bought our rail passes in the US, we paid the extra $70 per person to green the green pass, which gives us reserved seats on the shinkanses, an additional luxury on what can be crowded trains.

It took 2 1/2 hours to get to Kyoto, we waited a half hour or so in Nara, then 45 minutes on the local train to get to Nara. By 3:30pm, we were walking out of the Nara station to our ryokan, or Japanese guesthouse.