Okayama Castle

... , you read it correctly.. My friends Mac, Joe, Lily and I took a 6-7 hour road trip to a "nearby" prefecture called Okayama. We affectionately refer to it as our sister prefecture because the two names sound so much alike, and if you don't annunciate ...

... day with my host family, I was taken to Okayama city's most famous sights, the ever so pretty Koraku-en and the castley Okayama castle. I was lucky to arrive on the day of the rice planting festival. It was pretty cool really, There was a bit ...

... of such a thing over here, it was a pleasant surprise to see. The garden was also designed to incorporate neighboring Okayama castle as "borrowed scenery," a common characteristic of Japanese and Chinese gardens. Out of some stroke of fortune, the rain ...

... the castle mixed in with the blossoms. Pretty much we just cruised the park, took many photographs, and chatted. Himeji Castle is always beautiful, but the addition of the cherry blossoms all around really afforded us some great photo opportunities and ...

... is the reason we're visiting. Though the garden in Rinnoji Sendai was great, we haven't really seen any big Japanese landscapes. Okayama's castle can be seen in the background and can also be visited, but after seeing Nijo, Osaka and Iga Ueno's castles, ...

... friends after we go to our respective schools here in Japan. The first day four of us set out to tour the local castle (Okayama-jo) and the adjacent gardens.  Amazing.  What a thrill to see traditional Japan finally.  Walking through ...

We took the Shinkansen train to Okayama to visit the castle and gardens here.  The castle was quite impressive and the gardens, said to be among the 3 best in Japan, very pretty and peaceful.  The highlight of the day was my ...

went to okayama. have been wanting to go for a while. just happened to drop in the same weekend as the infamous NAKED MAN FESTIVAL. if that hadn't been going on, i might have bailed on the city after a few hours... not sure what exactly everyone has ...

... so schwarz ist). Diese wurde wie so viele andere im zweiten Weltkrieg zerstoert und wieder neu aufgebaut. Bekannt aber ist Okayama fuer seinen japanischen Garten, Koraku-En. Dieser zaehlt zu den drei schoensten Gaerten Japans (nun, die Japaner haben ...

... to find it closed between 29 - 31 December.... Good one. Himeji Castle is the last remaining original castle in the whole of Japan. Osaka has a castle but it was re-built around 50 years ago and... has a lift, very traditional! I was gutted to say ...