Kyoto during Sakura Season - Part 2: Kinkakau-ji

In this 2nd part series of our weekend trip to Kyoto, we are going to explore Kinkaku-ji. According to the Lonely Planet travel books, the Kinkaku-ji temple, also known as the Golden Pavillion, is the 2nd most famous sight in Japan, just after Mount Fuji.

This temple is famous for it being covered in gold leaf in its top 2 stories. Also known as Rokuon-ji, this temple was originally built in 1397 as a retirement home to shogun Ashikaga Yoshi-mitsu. After his death, his son converted it to a Buddhist temple, complying to his father's wishes. The original temple only had the top storey covered in gold leaf and is set in the middle of a pond. It has a bronze phoenix on top of the roof. In 1950 a crazy monk decided to burn the place down and tried to commit suicide (unsuccessfully). Oddly enough, he was only sentenced to 7 years of prison. Anyway, the full reconstruction was completed in 1955 and followed the original design exactly except they decided to cover the top 2 stories of the temple with gold leaf.

All I can say is, Ashigkaga Yoshi-mitsu sure knows how to retire in style!

My, err I mean, Ashikaga's retirement home

The phoenix on top of the roof, symbolizing the imperial family.


Us with our future retirement home in the background. Everyone's welcome!

 The pond garden:

No retirement home is complete without its own waterfall!

It is said historically that Aishikaga (that's right, we're on first name basis) invented the tea ceremony and turned it into an art form. This is known to be the oldest tea room in all of Japan and all current tea rooms resemble this layout (and they do!).