First stop was Heian Temple. It has a several large walkable zen gardens behind it. It probably would be nicer when the trees are in bloom, but still very nice.
Next was Chion-in. It had large grounds it covered but was otherwise more memorable for the monks chanting inside one of the temples. I could only see the tops of their heads, but I stayed and listened for a little while. They're pretty good at keeping a beat.
This temple also had the most frightening monkey warning sign in front of it.
I walked through Maruyama Park where there were lots of pigeons and girls in Kimonos.
Next was Yasaka Pagoda where I grabbed a tempura bowl lunch.
Then I went southeast to Kiyomizu-Dera which was my main target of the day. Even though its under construction (restoration and preservation) you can go in it and circle around a path on the outside and through a park. Besides the giants wooden structure it also has a tall iconic home depot orange pagoda where I took one of my better postcard photos.
After that I headed north west to Kenninji, the oldest Zen temple in Kyoto. It had several decorated sliding wall doors inside and a sand garden I stared at for a while. One of the temples had a ceiling painting done in 2002 to commemorate the temple's 800 year anniversary which was pretty neat, bit was also a little bit of a letdown finding out it was modern. There were several zen art pieces on display from the temples founding, one of which was an iconic piece of the gods of thinder and wind.
Last to do was just head back and go to sleep. I watched some netflix and relaxed a bit. The guestgouse got pretty busy later on as a couple groups came in, but othereise slept like a rock.
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