Tuesday, April 18, 2006

Japanese Garden and the Weather

Yesterday was the first time I had 2 days in a row off from work. I decided to take advantage of all that free time by heading to the Japanese Garden. I was there for about 3 hours. The first hour and a half I spent exploring the place by myself and then I took the guided tour. The tour price is outstanding, it’s free. Another nice thing about the tour is that it explains what to look for and some of the intent behind Japanese Garden designs. I had enjoyed the garden without help but the tour helped me understand what was going on. It basically put words to the visions for me. I was very glad I picked yesterday to go because it was quiet and there were not a lot of people. The guide said that days that had hail and rain were not busy days. Days like today when it is sunny and no clouds are in the sky would be considerably more crowded and the summer months it can be jammed packed. Part of the experience for me was a great sense of peace and calm, which is exactly what the designer meant to get across. The idea behind the gardens is a place to get away from the day to day life and it succeeded. For 3 hours I was completely happy and without a care in the world. Would I recommend you come to this garden when you visit? Yes I would. Click here to view the pictures: Incredible Photos:
The Japanese Garden actually has 5 garden designs on 5 acres of land. I took a few picture of each but some where harder to capture then others. The Natural Garden was a long winding garden that went down the hillside and looked less manicured then the others. It is still maintained but not as structured. This was hard to photograph. The Tea Garden was another that did not get much coverage and that was because it was a little dark I figure maybe later this summer I will have pictures of it maybe even with a tea ceremony being performed. The garden that is the one with the most photos is the Strolling Garden. It takes up a lot of territory and it is the first thing you see. It is also fairly easy to photograph. The Zen Garden was a challenge because it was a rectangular shape and I tried from several angles but was only satisfied by two of the pictures. The Flat Garden pictures also did not come out right so there is only one picture. I will try again some other time and hopefully that day the lighting and weather are more consistent. With the combination of rain, hail and sun the pictures came out strange but I salvaged all the pictures I could which was about a 1/3 of them. A few of them were even amazingly good. Let me know what you think.

Having said that I want to complain that on my two days off it rained and today when I sit down to study for my test it is completely blue skies. We already know it is my dad’s fault that the rain came but I just wanted to say ‘Grrr! Stupid weather.’ I would be ok with rain all week and rain on my days off but clear skies all week and rain on my days off? That is just not right. It is totally teasing me! It even hailed on me yesterday! As much as I want to play today, I have 3 days to prepare for my test so I actually have to get serious so I can pass my impending tests of doom! Enough crying, I am hitting the books.

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