ofusa kannon, hiroan

Saturday, after Satoshi's German class, it was the start of a 3-day weekend, so we headed to Nara to check out Ofusa Kannon's Fuurin (wind chime) Festival.

The sound of the wind chimes are supposed to evoke a "cool" feeling.

Also Buddhism believe that these wind chimes ward off evil.

This temple has many rose plants and also has a rose festival during the Spring and Autumn (which I hope we will be back to see).

I think it might be a rare thing to see western rose plants on a Buddhist temple ground.

I know when we were looking for flowers for my mom's funeral, roses (her favorite) were apparently not a good choice.

Anyway, when we got there, we went to the back of the property to their tea room in hopes of having some shaved ice.

They didn't really have a system and it was chaotic, so after being blown off and then being told they had run out of ice, we made our way to the hotel we would be staying at.

I will post about this hotel in a separate post.

(one more photo to click on to see a video I shot)

After freshening up and cooling down a bit, we went to search for dinner, we were again blown off by an apparently "reservations only" place...um, when your waitress/wife looks at us as we enter, and you, the chef/owner do the same, not even saying "irrashaimase" (welcome), not even approaching to tell us it is a "reservations only" place...we leave.

In the end, we ended up at a tiny izakaya near the station called Hiroan and the food was so good!

Yuzu cocktail thingy.

Assorted sashimi.

Okra & Nagaimo (chinese yam) salad..the shiso (perilla) dressing was super refreshing!

Ume dashi soup gyoza..I didn't care for this dish as it had a very "meaty"/gamey smell but Satoshi enjoyed it.

Perfectly cooked shrimp with homemade tartar sauce.

They didn't have those amuse bouche (things you pay for but didn't order)...whoo! so our total bill (with a beer, sake & cocktail) came out to a little over 5000 yen (which is cheap for us, usually our bill comes out to 7000 or so)

> Despite the bad service at those other places and the krazy heat & humidity, I'm glad the bulk of the day was nice.

Ofusa Kannon
6-22 Ousa-cho
Kashihara, Nara
Phone: 0744.22.2212
Hours: 7:00-17:00

Hiroan
1-9-6 Yagi-cho
Kashihara, Nara
Phone: 0744.23.5672
Open from 17:00
Closed Tuesdays