Forest in the city. City in the forest.

The main hall of Kiyomizudera Temple, stands in the wooded hills that offers you a nice view over Kyoto city. Below the terrace, you can taste the spring water that believe to have healing power.

Kiyomizudera ("Pure Water Temple") is one of the most celebrated temples in Japan. This temple was addded to the list of UNESCO World Heritage sites.

This temple features a unique style in which the building faces out over a high precipe with the floor supported by long pillars.

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Umeda Sky Building is a spectacular highrise and modern architecture is a landmark in Kita area of Osaka. It is also know as The Floating Garden Observatory. The 173m tall building consists of 2 towers which are conected with each other by the "Floating Gardern" at the very top, which is the 39th floor. Standing at the top floor gives you a great view of the city. Admission fee if 700 yen. It’s a 10-15 minute walk from Osaka and Umeda Stations.

I need to walk further down the street to take the whole view of the building.

Below the building, looking up…

The escalator at the top, connecting to the floating garden.

A panoramic landscape of Osaka. You can view through a full 360 degrees.

Another view from the open roof top observatory floor.

Old Japanese house behind Umeda Sky building.

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One of Osaka’s most uncompromisingly modern district, this business center of Kyobashi is home to its most imposing historical monument - The Osaka Castle named Himeji-jo. The original form of the castle remains almost intact and is an excellent example of Japanese wooden architecture reflecting the ultimate combination of beauty and functionality. Himeji-jo castle is also known by its nick "Shirasagi-jo" White Heron Castle in English. From the castle, the surrounding modern area looks like a city planner’s model landscape of forest, domes, mirror-clad buildings… but from the highrise, the castle seems an age away, an age out of which the city itself was born!

It’s all began over half a millenium ago, Osaka Castle was build in 1496. The temple functioned from the begining as a fort against the attack of surrounding feudal warlords. The famous tiled roof of the main tower is the first thing visible, the ridges culminating in cornices depicting great leaping golden carps, and the extensive black facings beneath the uppermost roof bear an array of nature - inspired designs done in gold.

The journey begins at the only point of access across the inner system of moats, the Sakaura-mon gate which leads to the inner courtyard.

The scale of the outer protective wall. Each clans was allocated a certain length of wall to build, based on how many bushels or "koku" of rice than clan produced. The largest weighting about 130 tons.

The entrance.

The 8th floor contains an outdoor observation deck. This photo shows a Shachi (roof tile in mythical ocean fish) that is found at the peak of the roof.

NHK building can be viewed from the Castle.

Street performing inside Castle compound area.

Monk… you can put some money in his bowl, but is this real or fake… I don’t know…

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