Golden Temple at Kyoto for Travel Photo Mondays
It’s Monday morning, time to enjoy some gorgeous travel photography and inspiration from around the world. Let’s banish those Monday blues by sharing gorgeous imagery and story telling.
Where is the Golden temple of Kinkaku-Ji located?
Situated in a quiet neighborhood area of Northwestern Kyoto, Kinkaku-Ji is one of the most famous templets in Kyoto. You can easily get to the temple from the regional buses that loop around the famous monuments of the city or take a taxi directly to this site.
Address: 1 Kinkakujicho, Kita Ward, Kyoto, 603-8361, Japan
A visit to the Golden Temple or Kinkaku-Ji at Kyoto
The Golden temple or Kinkaku-Ji in Kyoto is a beautiful Buddhist temple made with gold leaf and is one of the most popular temples to visit in Kyoto. A place of retirement and sanctuary for a Japanese nobleman, it was then converted into a zen temple upon his death. The temple is designated as a special historic monument and garden and part of the historic monuments of Kyoto.
What to do in Kyoto in four or five days? Make sure you make your first stop to visit the Golden Temple at Kinkaku-Ji, it is a classic and gorgeous landscape that places the temple is such a stunning waterscape and zen garden.
The temple roof is capped with a bronze phoenix ornament
There is a beautiful garden and trails surrounding the temple in the style of the Muromachi period, a timeframe considered the golden age of Japanese garden design. Created in a minimalist style and characterized with a reduction in scale of plantings (topiary and bonsai) and integrating the buildings naturally to the landscape. These are the hallmarks of a well designed environment while integrating distant views and landscape into the place and vista points where the temple is situated. Even though the temple grounds are small, the borrowed views of the distant hills and valleys add the overall grand scale of the entire environment.
Fall time at Kinkaku-ji
The entire complex was destroyed during a war, and then the temple itself was later burned down by a crazy novice monk. Rebuilt in 1955, the three level structure was then gilded in gold leaf in the upper stories to symbolize a purification of thoughts on death. Also, the lavish design principles embellishing with gold leaf were in line with of the Muromachi style of excess.
The pond fronting the Golden temple represents a Kyocho-chi or mirror lake which reflects the pavilion and connects it to the outside world. The small islands in the pond represent the Japanese islands and the miniature (bonsai) plantings, rock elements and bridges represents Zen ideology with references to famous places in Japanese and Chinese literature.
More details to visiting the Golden temple of Kinkaku-Ji
After you enter, grab a map to follow the trails and places of interest to visit around the complex and make sure you walk the trail from above to see the temple grounds and surrounding areas below
tip – Fall time is fantastic for fall foliage and spring time is a great time to visit for the sakura cherry blossom blooms.
Hours – 9am to 5pm
Parking is only available on the street
General entry price – 400 Yen
Property is open year round
Check out their website here
Please check out these other posts on visiting Kyoto, Japan
Beautiful gardens of Kyoto, Japan
Conclusion to visiting the Golden Temple of Kinkaku-Ji in Kyoto
It was a fun visit to the Golden Temple at Kyoto, I hope you enjoyed the tour for Travel Photo Mondays. Please come and visit the blogs below for more interesting places and photos from around the world today.
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Noel just a question, do you know any other Link up Photo pages? I was wondering if it is a very popular thing those days?
Hi Marysia,
Yes, check out travel photo Thursday, there are a few that are more photos from your home town to
As always beautiful photos!
Stunning photos, Noel! Kinkaku-Ji is a temple of unique beauty! We love your shots and would like to invite you to participate in the next edition of our Travel Photography Competition. Here are more details:
Enjoy your Monday! http://hitchhikershandbook.com/your-contributions/travel-photography/
beutiful photos again, what a lovely place!
Love your photos especially the first one, and the black and white one. Pinning them on Pinterest! : )
Great photos, I love the vivid colors 🙂
You managed to get some really good photos of the Golden Temple. Impressive.
Your pictures of the temples are wonderful. Really breathtaking.
Hi Noel, the link up tool is not showing.
The Golden Temple looks very majestic. Stunning photos as always.
Sorry about the inconvenience, i’ll try to get this worked out when i get back to the US for next weeks edition.
Wow, that building is absolutely beautiful, Noel! Of course I love the Phoenix ornament as that is the name of my Golden Retriever, Phoenix 🙂