For cherry blossoms this year, I took a day off of work on Monday and went to see the cherry blossoms in Kyoto.  The place I went to is called Arashiyama which translates directly into Storm Mountain (or, Mount Storm.  That sounds cooler I think).  It was pretty late in the season so the cherry flowers were beginning to fall and turn green.

Anyway, I'll stop talking now so you can look at the pretty little pictures...

Arashiyama Station. 

We took a trail up a mountain side and we came to this shrine.

And then...

MONKEY!  or really big squirrels...no, I'm pretty sure they were monkeys...

That's the city of Arashiyama in the background.

Lot's monkeys.  It reminded me of Al Hitchcock's classic horror movie: "Monkeys"

And baby monkeys...awwww

Appearantly, they haven't figured out how to use benches correctly.  Stupid monkeys
But so cute...

And deer too.

Then, it was off to Tenryu Temple.  Tenryu temple is called Tenryu Temple because "ten" means heavens and "ryu" means dragon in Japanese, and there is an enormous painting of a dragon on the ceiling of one of the main halls.  The dragon is HUGE, and insanely cool looking!  I couldn't get any shots of it, but here are shots of some of the other areas.

Tatami rooms.  It was a pretty expansive place.  I overheard some tour guide saying it has twice the area of Tokyo Dome. 

Japanese gardens... 

Then we walked through a bamboo forest

and took a mountain train ride to Kameoka Hot Springs

the end...