Fukuoka

Today we joined 2 other couples for a private tour, one couple from Dallas had set it up and had posted on Cruisecritic a couple months ago that they were looking for 2 other couples to join and share expense. We joined them along with a couple from Toronto and had the best day and a wonderful tour guide Erica, she is from the area but went to college in Michigan so had perfect English. We started with s bus ride to the train station where we then took a train to one of the most important Buddhist temples, Nanzo-in Temple.

We had a short walk to the temple passing over a cool little bridge, Melody Bridge with a xylophone type edge along the top to play music on.

At the shrine we were inspected by a guard as to if we were appropriately dressed, no tattoos can be exposed, and no knees exposed. I thought knee length was fine but not shoulders so had brought a scarf but he wanted me to use it to cover my knees, the men all had to pull their shorts down to cover knees. It was just so hot we didn’t want to wear long pants! They did offer blue towels and clips yo use to cover up but our group passed inspection and we continued on into the beautiful grounds. There were signs no pictures allowed but our guide said it was okay to just snap a few quick pictures here and there but no videos.

She told us that Shinto, the original and main Japanese religion and Buddhism main religion of China are very much aligned in Japan, so much so at this Temple, as well as others, include areas for both. We visited the Shinto Shine area.

Lastly we saw the largest reclining bronze Buddha in the world, its length is the same size as the Statue of Liberty.

To say a prayer here you hold the ribbons that are attached to the Buddhas hand and throw a coin into the offering.

Then we took the train back to town and had the famous Fukuoka ramen. Erica told us what makes this areas ramen special, rich pork broth, very firm noodles, all the optional toppings and helped us order on the machine since everything was in Japanese. For a gal who doesn’t like pasta I even enjoyed the ramen!

We walked around a big city park popular for families.

Went to a beautiful traditional Japanese zen garden.

Occasonally mist is released over the gardens for a cooling effect.

We saw couples there getting wedding pictures done.

Erica walked us past the Fukuoka Art museum, we didn’t have time to go inside.

We didn’t have time to go in as we all had to get back to ship early to go through customs before our next stop in South Korea. We ended our wonderful day with a beautiful sunset view seen from our little cabin window.