Kamakura visit

Kamakura train station:

Kamakura

After leaving the Ryokan in Tskuba, we arrived back in Tokyo at the Grand Prince Hotel Akasaka around noon, and then a few of us who had gone to other locations on our free day decided to take the much raved about trip to the city of Kamakura, located about 1 hour south of Tokyo and home to the world famous “great Buddha.” Once we arrived at the train station in Kamakura with someone who had gone to the city before, we huddled onto a city bus, opting for public transportation instead of walking to take us to the “great Buddha.” Five minutes later, stepping off the bus, we saw a swathe of tall trees, fully plumed and situated closely, masking the view of the Buddha. We then crossed the street and entered a kind of toll-plaza entryway for foot-traffic, and then after paying 200 yen (around 2 dollars) a piece, we passed through a gate and beheld the pathway and stairs leading to the attraction.



As you can see, the great Buddha, sitting in a meditative state, no doubt chanting “Ooooom” silently to himself, is a daunting sculpture of bronze. Despite its enormity, the Buddha and its environs offer a kind of serenity and peace. With incense burning in various small receptacles, the sweet scent in the air gives pause for silence even though swarms of onlookers and amateur photographers jockey for position to take a memorable photo.

Here above, you can see the great Buddha's flip-flops, which are absolutely enormous. They are actually taller than I am (which, as you well know is quite tall), and seem like they very well might fit the great Buddha's feet should he decide to stand and walk across the landscape.

For 200 yen more, we were each able to go inside the hollow Buddha.

Being inside was somewhat how you would imagine being inside of an enormous pot belly stove or cauldron with 20 or so other people might feel like: not for the claustrophic.

Having had our fill of Buddha watching and souvenir shopping, we stopped for lunch in what we later found out was a Chinese restaurant. My friend Laura and I enjoyed a dish reminiscent of glorified top ramen, and then wound our way through a series of souvenir shops, departing with some of our yen for memories and small trinkets.

Kamakura is a situated like a crescent moon in small bay, so we thought we would take in the sights of the beach. There were plenty of surfers in the distance trying there luck on small, curling waves, but most floated about guided back to shore by the current. One of the English Teaching Assistants at the High school in Kamisu-city told us that he liked to surf, and that he did there on the coast near the port of Kashima, warned us that for the most part the beaches he had been to in Japan were trashed. Literally. He said that the Japanese, despite keeping their cities immaculate, had no problem depositing their picnicking, beach-combing rubbish across the sandy beaches already riddled with kelp and seaweed strewn about. Kamakura was no different.

We walked to the beach, then on the beach, and then quickly moved away from the beach because not only were the streets cleaner, the view of the beach and the bay from the Buddhist temple located on the southern hillside of the city was immeasurably better.

This particular Temple was surrounded by amazing landscapes filled with Technicolor flowers, meditation ponds with irises abounding, and stairways and paths zig-zagging through it all.

Luckily, we made it in time to enjoy the scenery before the temple monks called through megaphones, informing everyone that closing time had arrived.

With that, we walked back to the train station instead of taking the bus, got a bit lost but eventually found our way to the train and back to Tokyo for an evening of rest. Sometimes the journey is more important than the destination.