Massive Picture Post Featuring Fall Foliage Part 1

Oi vey! I just counted and there are some kind of many many pictures for this post. I apologize in advance. If you don't like pictures, check back in 3 days or so. This weekend I went to Shosenkyo, which is a famous place to go and see the fall leaves. As it turns out, I am not great at directions and such. I paid 12 dollars to park where I found a whole lot of people in cars. The guy trying to help me showed me a map and said a bunch of things I didn't understand. The only word we could communicate to each other was 'walk.' So I started out on my hike through the canyon. 

 Feelin' good, getting started. Not bad eh?

 All the boulders were white in this river. They were GIANT!

 Trees and nature things

 A horse drawn carriage!

 That smelled like horses...

I was not impressed with the leaves...or the hike at this point. 

 Still, it wasn't bad.

 This is a weird looking rock...which I took a picture of. 

 OH! Make that TWO pictures!

 Pretty view of the river.

 Finally got some leaves color, rather than just dead trees. 

 This really doesn't need a comment right? 

 Now I have seen this before. Tell me this isn't the EXACT pen from Jurassic Park. Japan already looks like Japan, and this looks like the T-Rex pen. Awesome.

 Artistic right? I am totally going to make a Facebook group and make you all join it. I have threatened before, and I will threaten again. I am going to call it ShutterBugz Studio or something cliche like that. 

 This is the actual Pride rock, where Rafiki presented Simba.

 Unfortunately, the river doesn't look raftable.

 Water...its hard to come up with witty comments about boring old nature. 

 I took this picture because it looks like the place that Frodo hides from the Ringwraiths on the road to Bree.

 Oh yeah, this is the point where I tell you about how I grossly misunderstood this hike. I was told by the other people that went that the hike to the upper falls (coming in the next post) was a nice, short hike. After about 20 minutes of hiking, I saw a sign and was thinking that I had to be about halfway there...right? 

I was thinking that this hike was not seeming very easy, or worthy of its spot on the top 10 fall leaf gorges in Japan.  

 People seem to be having a good time.

 ShutterBugz!

 Creepy right? I totally think a troll lives in that little cave...as you can tell, I was beginning to get bored of the hike. 

 So that sign I saw, it told me that I was like an eighth of the way to the waterfalls. Yeah...I made a huge mistake. Instead of the really easy breezy 1 km hike, I was now in for 5km up and 5km back. Yeah...I make poor choices in parking.

 They have some weird affinity for crystals at this place. I even visited a crystal museum! Here is a quaint little restaurant where you can eat at crystal tables and whatnot. 

 Geodes...

 I really like this picture

 I think this brings fertility (I do not know that for sure, it was not mentioned at all).

 I like this little statue thing.

 Now the trees were starting to get thicker, and the colors were coming in. 

 A cool patio with all the fallen leaves.

 Quaint right? I love the word quaint, it makes me faint for my wanting to paint.

 Signs for bears. According to my understanding, there was a bear here on August 23rd...but I don't read Kanji.

 I took a detour through the woods because a sign told me to do it. 

 From the bridge (which swayed a little too much for my liking).

 The "trail"

 Japanese forests are a little creepy...just so you know. 

 And then this happened. There was a shrine back in the woods!

 Sign for the shrine. 

 Look at this stair construction, so 9th century...amirite?

 Those rails are new...I can tell. 

 Another statue marking the entrance to the shrine. 

 The other bridge. 

 Bridges connect people...(I really don't have a comment)

 Technically, this is where you are supposed to start the trail.

 I was pretty sure I was headed toward that big hill thing. 

 Would you look at that? A parking spot! 

 That sign indicates where I am there in the middle. I walked from the very bottom left.

 I understand why all the people start up here. The leaves are significantly nicer.

 A tiny pagoda!

 You can see the little oranges on the trees. They are called minkans (I think)

 They have restaurants and even a hotel on the byway. 

 Bamboo forest! Can't get those in the US...

 This mountain thing is one of the attractions...I've seen better.

 Meh.

 The wash from the river coming down the mountain.

 This also reminds me of the Lord of the Rings.

 Right during the breaking of the fellowship at the end of the first movie.

 An unfortunate and sad table...no one wants to sit at this table. I think its name is Linus. Linus the Lonely Little Table. 

This is one of the top 10 best pictures I have ever taken...if only the people weren't ruining it with their being in it.