Our day trip with a bad ankle to Kamakura

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  Kamakura, Japan
Thursday, January 11, 2007

We took a day trip out to Kamakura, unfortunately Peter had sprained his ankle so couldnt walk on it too much so we concentrated our time in Hase (a little town that is part of the Kamakura area). We started off at the Great Buddha of Kamakura which was cast in bronze in 1252 AD and is hollow. It used to be inside a temple but that was washed away by a tsunami just over 500 years ago so it has been outside, exposed to the elements ever since. We paid an extra 20 yen to go inside the body which was quite surreal!

Then we headed to another temple, called Hase-dera, stopping off on the way at Kosokuji temple. Hase-dera is home to the largest 11 headed Kannon (Buddhist deity) in Japan and also has the most beautiful gardens with watherfalls, stream and pools. As well as the big Kannon they have a temple dedicated to Jizou - the god who protects the souls of unborn children and travellers. It has hundreds of tiny little Jizou statues which are dressed in bibs and woolly hats to keep them warm, and people pray to them when they have lost children through miscarriage or abortion to keep the soul safe until it is time for it to come back to Earth. Pete did his best to take pictures that fit together to form a panoramic view of the area - flick through them quickly to get the idea of what it looks like!

We also went into Benten Kutsu which is a shrine in a cave. It is full of statues and carvings and you have to duck really low to walk through it. The walls are covered in water running down through the rock. Was really cool but we were a bit worried what would happen if there was an earthquake!!

PS we were really impressed with a cool vending machine at Fujisawa station that is why we have included a video of us buying green tea!!

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02 Guardians of the gate	03 Approaching the Buddha	04 Michelle and Buddha	05 Pete and Buddha
06 Great Buddha of Kamakura	07 Great Buddha of Kamakura	08 Great Buddha of Kamakura	09 Buddha's big shoes!
10 Back of the Buddha	11 Inside the Buddha	12 Inside the Buddha	13 Inside the Buddha
14 Michelle inside the Buddha	15 Money left inside the Buddha for prayers	16 Money left inside the Buddha for prayers	17 Jizou statue at Kotokuin temple
18 Monument at Kotokuin temple	19 Kosokuji temple	20 Kosokuji temple	21 Gardens at Kosokuji temple
22 Gardens at Kosokuji temple	23 Gardens at Kosokuji temple	24 Hase-dera temple	25 Gardens at Hase-dera
26 Gardens at Hase-dera	27 Hase-dera	28 Gardens at Hase-dera	29 Panoramic view of Jizou-dou 1
30 Panoramic view of Jizou-dou 2	31 Panoramic view of Jizou-dou 3	32 Panoramic view of Jizou-dou 4	33 Panoramic view of Jizou-dou 5
34 Panoramic view of Jizou-dou 6	35 Panoramic view of Jizou-dou 7	36 Jizou	37 Jizou statues
38 Jizou statues	39 Jizou statues	40 Hase-dera	41 Statues at Hase-dera
42 View from Hase-dera	43 Rotating bookracks containing sutras at Kyozou	44 Turning the bookracks at Kyozou	45 Bamboo
46 Michelle and bamboo	47 Gardens at Hase-dera	48 bell at Hase-dera	49 Burning incense
50 Amida-Nyorai	51 Amida-Nyorai	52 Bell	53 Benten Kutsu
54 Benten Kutsu	55 Benten Kutsu	56 Michelle in Benten Kutsu	57 Benten Kutsu
58 Benten Kutsu	59 Benten Kutsu	60 Benten Kutsu	61 Benten Kutsu
62 Benten Kutsu	63 Benten Kutsu	64 Copying sutras at Benten-dou	65 Benten-dou
66 Buying green tea

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