arashiyama

on august 16th steven and i 

ventured out to arashiyama 

along with thousands of other people to witness

the daimonji gozan okuri-bi send off fires.

these are five fires on different hillsides

around kyoto

that each show a japanese symbol.

though the origins of this festival

are unknown, today the fires are representative of 

guiding the spirits of the dead

back to the Buddhist Pure Land.

i didnt get any pictures of the fires 

as they were pretty far off,

but the day was wonderful and

we also witnessed the paper lantern festival 

in arashiyama where

countless paper lanterns are released on the

Oi river...

-e

there was festival type food everywhere on this little towns busiest day

we walked along the famous bamboo grove outside tenryu-ji temple

the first picture of us! taken by us!

skipping rocks by the river

more festival food

the platform where the paper lanterns were let go

this is only a fraction of haw many lanterns were made and sent off

tako yaki!! octopus balls.