We didn’t have a plan for Friday. We had kicked around several ideas. Everyone got up pretty slowly, milling about having breakfast. Finally Katie said, “So, what should we do today?” and Priscila replied, “See the deer!” Soon, everyone was getting ready and we were on the train.
Nara is a must-see when you’re in Osaka and I suspected it would be just as amazing the second time (Katie’s fifth time!). Plus it’s always fun to see things through other people’s eyes. I’ve heard several people say it was one of their favorite places and I would agree.
The train ride to Nara is mostly above ground and a great way to see the city and the mountains. It was another perfect weather day–dry, sunny, 72 degrees. When we arrived, Katie suggested Priscila try macha mochi–that green doughy thing filled with bean paste which Katie really enjoys. We sat by the lake and somehow it turned into a food deal with Todd: Katie and I would each give him 500 yen if he would try the macha mochi. We set up stipulations: He had to have a real bite, chew it and swallow it, and it had to be in the next 60 seconds….and he did! It is a very weird taste and even weirder texture–like eating sweet spongy mashed up beans. No, he didn’t like it.
Because we went to the mochi place first, we took a different route into the deer park where there was this amazing pagoda outshining all the other buildings.
This five-story pagoda is in the Kofuku-ji Buddhist temple. Everywhere there were people taking pictures with the rich cloudless sky and trees outlining the building. 
Just past the path beside the building is Nara Park. Wikipedia says the park is over 1,240 acres and is the one of the oldest parks in Japan, established in the 1300’s. And as I talked about in my post from my first visit, the sika deer roam free here. No matter how often you see them they really are remarkable. Everywhere you look you can see them roaming through the grass or trees, or walking up to people to get one of the wafers sold by vendors. There are signs explaining that they can be a little aggressive and we noticed them following people once they knew you had a treat for them. We found it best to not feed them because they were just calm and lovely. 
This is the park that includes the giant Buddha statue–the largest in Japan. (You can see photos on my earlier post.) As soon as you walk into the doorway of the building that houses this amazing statue, everyone just naturally stops and gasps; even the high school-age boy next to me stopped in his tracks and said, “Whoa.” Of course the building itself has to be huge and I really tried to appreciate how ornate and solid the wood is to enclose something so important.
There were many groups of school children of all ages on this visit. There was a long line for them to crawl through the hole in the pillar that represents the size of Buddha’s nostril–quite the highlight for them, I am sure! There are pretty little souvenir stands at the exit and places where you can have something written in Japanese.
The woods in the park are open so you can see into the trees with the deer wandering through. There are many pathways with stone lanterns and statues.
We walked to the temple at the top of a hill so we could enjoy the view of the city. On such a clear day you could see how many buildings make of the temple complex. 
We stopped at a tea stand, where you are welcome to enjoy a cup of tea or water for free. When you are done, you wash your cups and leave them for others. There was Japanese artwork covering the walls in the simple, open building. Shoes off, of course.
Katie and I waited while Todd and Priscila toured the shrine with all the gold lanterns. We followed the walkway that is lined with stone lanterns a long way through the woods back towards the deer park. Todd had been trying to get the deer to bow to him and they would a little. The last deer we saw before leaving the park was this guy. He and Todd faced each other and bowed over and over–Priscila caught it on video and you could hear everyone around us laughing! 
The train home is about an hour, so we decided to get some dinner before we left. Katie and Mike had gone to a place that had a large menu of items she thought everyone would like, but she couldn’t remember the name. With her keen detective sense, she took us through a really pretty area of the town, sort of like Winter Park. The walkways were tiled with little shops and bakeries throughout the narrow lanes. Soon she did in fact find the restaurant, “Naranicle,” which was cute and had a table right by the window.
Conveniently the menu had small items, like tapas, I guess. We ordered fries, pizza, steak, salad, and 2 types of bruschetta, one with avocado and salmon, another more traditional with tomatoes and cheese……or so we thought. Priscila is a vegetarian and a no meat option works for Katie and me, so when the bread came we thought the shredded stuff on top was cheese. Priscila checked it out and pronounced it fish. So Katie ate my avocado and salmon and I took a bit of the other and it was good. Katie examined it more closely and said, “I definitely see eyeballs, so I’m not eating it.”
O.M.G.
Really I hate to be such a food baby but my stomach just lurched and I was only mildly courteous as I used my napkin to spit out the bite in my mouth. We didn’t even care that we scraped off whatever it was and Todd ate the dry bread. After dinner I asked Katie what she thought it was….tiny fish. I really felt Japan should have been more clear and even Katie agreed we weren’t the first gaijin to leave a pile of minnows on our plate. I declared that was the end of any experimentation on my part!
Otherwise the food was really good. The steak didn’t arrive so we debated the best way to handle that. I was worried that if we weren’t careful we would end up with a second order, which you may recall happened to me once. We discussed our options and decided to go up to the cash register to pay. The waitress said, “Meat?” “Cancel?” We said no and went back to our table pretty happy at our cleverness. And the thin slices of steak were juicy and delicious, with crazy root vegetables and mushrooms on the side.
The train home caught the city at sunset, which was more beautiful than the picture shows. When we had taken the high speed train by Mount Fuji, some people had their blinds shut or didn’t even glance up. Similarly, we were the only ones to admire the view of Katie’s city. It made me wonder again–what do I see often that I just don’t even notice anymore but it’s actually amazing? 
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