Summer Vacation 2014: Himeji Castle and Koko-en

Now that I'm back in Himeji, I of course had to show my brother the almost-fully-finished Himeji Castle and the Koko-en. With Typhoon Halong coming in tonight, the weather has been pretty icky here; but fortunately, it stopped raining during the afternoon, so we were able to enjoy ourselves in the nice, cool weather. And even luckier for us, due to the bad weather the cranes were kept folded down, so they didn't interrupt our view of the castle!

A lot of people have been commenting around Japan about how white the roof of the recently renovated main castle is compared with the roofs of the other buildings. There is a logical explanation, however: this is what the roof originally looked like when the castle was first built, with its white clean lines. However, after repeated buildup of soot from air pollution, it will eventually turn as dark as the roofs on the other buildings. For now, I will enjoy the clean, unpolluted roof!

So, some of my favorite photos from today of the garden and the castle:

The castle cats were out in force this afternoon, enjoying the cool weather and the break in the rain.

Some of the trees are already showing a slight change to autumn colors, even though it's the beginning of August!

A lone lotus blossom was open in the garden, it looked stunning!

Everything was still wet from the rain that had only ended an hour before.

Caught this cat at just the right instant as it looked back at me! They're rarely so photogenic for me.

It's a bit difficult to photograph the castle on an overcast day, but I did my best. At least there were no pesky cranes in the way!

With a bit of creative angling, you can photograph the castle now without any of the construction equipment showing. However, it won't be fully finished until March 27th, 2015.

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Daley-sensei's Adventures in Himeji, Japan.

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