Genthar.net: Day 3 Pictures

Today we went to Nara. Nara was once the Capital of Japan, before it moved to Kyoto, and thence to Tokyo.

In Nara Park, there are a great many temples and shrines, far too many to show here even if I had great pictures of all of them, which I don't. Being another wet and rainy day the pictures are a bit gray, but here are some of the better ones.

Kasuga Grand Shrine is known for the thousands of stone lanterns that line the path approaching the temple, as well as the metal lanterns inside the temple grounds.

On the grounds of Nara Park there are a lot of tame (and coincidentally fat) sacred deer. For a small fee you can purchase deer cookies to feed the deer with. Needless to say the deer more or less instantly recognize when a tourist steps up to one of the stores that sells the cookies and begin swarming...

Also in the park is Todaiji Temple, the largest wooden structure in the world. To give you an idea of the scale, look at the people standing at the entrance if you can see them in the picture. Also note the big bronze lantern near the front. This building, rebuilt in 1692 after a fire, is 2/3 the size of the original building.

Here's a closer shot of the bronze lantern. Note that those are kids about junior high school age, moving around in front of the lantern when I took the shot.

Inside the immense wooden structure is the Daibutsudan, or Great Buddha Image. Again, note for scale, the worker in blue attending to the candlesticks in front of the Daibutsudan. The Daibutsudan is about 53 feet tall! Each hand is taller than a typical human.

Of course a structure as large as Todaiji has a number of massive support pillars. I'm guessing somewhere during construction, the workers put a hole in the column intending it to be up top, did it wrong, and simply flipped the column over and used the other side. Somewhere along the way it the legend cropped up that if you can fit through the hole, your wishes will come true. Most children of course can fit through this with ease...