Also Delayed... More Cats and Autumn Leaves at Nagoyama Temple~!

Nagoyama's still one of my favorite places to go, and luckily for me I can now see it every day from my classroom while teaching! So I knew when the leaves were just right, and made sure to pop over with my camera on a clear day--this autumn was unusually short, cold, and rainy, so there weren't many such days this year! It was very relaxing to walk my favorite path through the mountain area.

At first, there seemed to be a lot less cats than I remembered from previous visits. But fortunately, they started appearing once I worked my way through a bit. Most of the cats were quite feral, but fortunately outside the main pavilion the friendly cat colony was still there. Most of the cats I saw had tipped ears, so it seems like modern cat colony population management techniques are finally making their way over to Japan (except around the castle. I've counted at least eight separate litters of kittens around the castle since I've arrived!). It was great to play with three exceptionally friendly cats on a lovely weekend morning.

Cherries aren't famous for their autumn colors, but when you get enough of them together, they still look fabulous in the fall!

The main temple building was difficult to photograph for some reason this day (perhaps because of the strong sun?), but it looked great as a background for this stone lantern.

A view from the upper levels of the main temple. Look at all those cherry and ginkgo trees!

This was the shyest of the three cats, but once he warmed up to you he'd deign to let you rub his belly. In the meantime, he was great at posing in the autumn colors!

This chatty tom (recently neutered, I suspect) was just talking and talking and talking the entire time. He'd only relax once I started petting him, and then he'd just melt into a puddle on the sidewalk in bliss. He had quite the purr!

This little lady was not as friendly as the tom, but not too shy either. She was clearly the object of the chatty-tom's affections, and she didn't much care for his overbearing behavior. Still, she liked being pet quite a bit!

The tom taking a break from talking to scratch an itch.

Talk about a scenic pose, right? This cat knows how to frame a photo!

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Autumn Leaves and Castle Cats

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Daley-sensei's Adventures in Himeji, Japan.

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