Here is a shot of the acres of pink azaleas that were in bloom at the Imperial gardens.
We left Atlanta around 5:30 PM on Sunday, June 23, on Delta Flight #55. It was a non-stop flight that took about 14 hours. It was long but very pleasant. Three meals and four movies later, we arrived in the Narita airport about 30 miles Northeast of Tokyo. We were met by Mr. Fukuda and thus began our saga.
There were two big events this day. We rode the train into Tokyo and visited the Imperial gardens. Then in the evening we went with Satomi and Tomoaki Satoh to see a baseball game in the domed stadium in Seibu.
Here is a shot of the acres of pink azaleas that were in bloom at the Imperial gardens.
The big event of this date was our all day trip on the Hatto Tour Bus to Yokohama and Kamakura. Kamakura was the capital of Japan from about 1198 to 1333. It is now a cross between a seaside resort and a tourist attraction. It contains 3 of the 5 most important temples in Japan
Here is Patty next to the statue of a Japanese Leprechaun.
Here are Patty and Dan at the temple of ??, which contains the second largest Buddha in Japan.
The Buddha was built in 1192 and is about 90 feet tall. In 1456 the Buddha survived a tsunami which destroyed the temple which housed it, and about 100 years later it survived an earthquake which damaged the foundation. We were able to go inside and see that its construction is similar to that of the Statue of Liberty, alhough it's a lot older.