Hike away the day!

Last week the Explorer's had another outing ... hard to top the last one to the Yamate area in Yokohama but we were going to try. This time we were keeping it a bit closer to home, traveling to the Kamakura area for a 3 hour hike over the hills of Kamakura. We started the hike at the Zen temple of Meigetsu-in in Kita-Kamakura, following Walk no. 35 from A Flower Lover's Guide to Tokyo. The weather was with us – crisp January morning, clear blue skys. A perfect day to walk off some holiday fare.

Meigetsu-in is known for their beautiful hydrangea's, but with six months ahead of us before we'd be able to enjoy them we still managed to find beauty in a winter zen garden, and a bit of humor as well. One of my favorite photos I've taken in Japan so far has to be the one with the pink ear muffs on the Buddha. This image to me captures in a moment how very different two cultures can be. I cannot begin to imagine what someone would think back in the U.S. if someone decided to put ear muffs on a statue of Jesus, and heaven forbid if they did that they would choose pink! And while this did amuse me a bit at first - mostly the color pink because of American's total hang up on that color for a guy - it also made me stop and think "why not put on ear muffs?" If you believe that it's a representation then I suppose you'd want to take care of them and keep them warm. Maybe we Westerner's make things just a little too precious, maybe putting the ear muffs on Buddha makes him seem more real ...

After enjoying the grounds we headed off in search of the Ten-en Hiking Course. Thank goodness Bossy Explorer invited one of her Japanese friends Reiko-san along, because I seriously doubt we would have found the correct entrance without her. The trail head we were looking for was not exactly obvious to a bunch of Americans who cannot read Kanji. Note the photo in the slideshow ... this was to be the Kanji we were searching for for the next 3 hours, making sure we stayed on the correct path as we worked our way to the end destination point - Zuisen-ji, a wabi-sabi zen temple on the Kamakura side of the hills. The walk from the guidebook is billed as a Narcissus walk, but we were hard pressed to find any along the way. Instead, we had a nice walk in the woods that day, periodically passing by Japanese Nationals calling out the greeting of "konnichiwa!"

At the end of the hike we went to Zuisen-ji, known for it philosophical garden designed by Soseki around 1327. There's a large cave at the back with two bridges and a waterfall, but truthfully I was much more taken with the Japanese maples that still had their foliage. I mean it's January! How is that possible? With the afternoon light filtering down through the trees it was like hitting a photographers jackpot. Another place I made a note to self, that I must come back to, when I had more time to just sit and be. It is far away from the hustle and bustle of Kamakura – a respite from everyday life, very Zen and of course ... inspiring.