May 10, 2010

Oushuu33Kannon Temples 11-12-13 Part 12


Almost as soon as we had passed through the small row of hills that bordered the river on this side, we came to a large Shinto Shrine. Again in deference to our goal of reaching two more temples on our route, we passed by without stopping.
After the shrine, we found ourselves in fruit tree country again. Both sides of the road were lined with orchards. Also the road was quite unusual for Japan - it was straight.
The fruit trees had obviously been trimmed drastically, probably to make harvesting the fruit easier. All of the trees were shorter than a man with outstretched hands.
Some of the trees took on strange and fantastic shapes, reminding me of dragons.
The orchards went all the way from the hills on our left across a wide, flat valley to the hills on the other side. It appeared that there might have been a river in the middle somewhere but, if there was, we could not see it from our road.

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