We started at 8 am, after breakfast in the hotel, with a welcome from the tour leaders and a lecture by Dr. Michelle Damian on traditional Japanese gardens.  We took a bus through the Arashiyama district to the Tenryu-ji temple.  It’s called “Temple of the Heavenly Dragon” and is the head of the Rinzai Zen Bhuddism.  It’s a large collection of buildings that dated from 786, but grew and shrunk due to new buildings and at least eight fires.  One of the monks was an American, Thomas Kerchner, who had lived there 20 or 30 years, and gave us a wonderful talk about zen buddhism.  The monks have a restaurant, Shigetsu, where they serve an elaborate vegetarian meal.  There were vegetables that we had never seen before.  After lunch we walked through the property and gardens, and then continued to the Sagano Bamboo Forest on a beautiful winding pathway through the tall bamboo

Back to the hotel about 4 pm, meeting up again at 5:15 pm for a bus to The Sodoh restaurant in the Higashiyama district.  This was an elaborate welcome dinner for the group and included a presentation by a former geisha and a maiko (an apprentice geisha).

Photos from the morning’s talks by the tour leader and Dr. Damian:

Here are photos from the temple:

And here are photos from the welcome dinner and geisha presentation: