Today I met up with Lorraine and Leona, and went with them to the Meiji Shrine by train. The shrine is located a fair way inside the park, and the path to it is lined with trees.
On the way were a number of kiosks showing chrysanthemums,
including bonsai chrysanthemums.
We were all very impressed by these. After we visited the shrine, which was crowded, Leona and I went to the inner garden. It is probably very impressive when the azaleas are in bloom, or when the maples are in colour, but we weren’t as impressed as we expected, so we left it fairly soon.
We then caught two trains to Koishikawa Korakuen which was an absolutely beautiful garden. It is the oldest garden in Tokyo, and is representative of other gardens from both Japan and China. I really liked the various different paths in this garden. We both spent a fair bit of time here because it was so beautiful, despite this being the wrong time of year to see it in its full glory.
There was a patch of rice, which the original owner included in the garden to show his son how difficult rice farming was. This was in the iris valley. The trellis is growing wisteria.
The full moon bridge was created by one of the Confucian master builders. The reflection in the water makes a full circle.
We then caught the trains back to our starting point. Trains in Tokyo are very regular - I think we may have waited two minutes for one of them, but that was the longest. There are a large number of lines, both above and below ground, and there are tunnels that join the different lines at stations. Fortunately, these are well signposted. Once we had to walk through a platform for a different line to get to the correct line.
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