26/12/2025
Boxing Day today we headed out to the north Higashiyama district of Kyoto, where you can find lots of beautiful zen gardens around the many Buddhist temples, so a really great area for garden hopping. Of course it’s winter and no cherry blossom, with a very cold north-westerly blowing in from Siberia, so wrapping up warm is essential. Despite winter the garden we found looked incredibly beautiful with many ericaceous trees, shrubs, conifers, flowering camellias, and the beautiful moss that is cultivated here to act as a ground cover and background to everything. These gardens are famous for their mossy hills and slopes, so still lots to admire. Also bamboo groves, interesting ways of using all sizes of bamboo in garden fences, structures, bridges, well and drain covers. The trees are all pruned to create a tiered structure and the branches architectural beauty. I found plenty to see as a gardener and I can only imagine how beautiful the cherry blossom would look in spring. We took a bus up to the Ginkaku-ji temple or Silver Pavilion where they take raking gravel to the next level! Also from there you can pick up the philosopher’s path which is a 2km walk along a leafy canal, currently flanked with flowering camellias and in spring it’s all cherry blossom. They seem to have an invasive insect problem attacking the trees, so that’s interesting to read. Winding your way back along the path there are lovely cafes, shops and many more temples, including the UNESCO heritage Ryoan-hi temple with its famous zen gravel gardens.
