Thursday 4th of May; Kamakura and Shirakawa

A sad announcement today, this is my last night in Japan. The last two nights I spent having goodbye drinks with my (Japanese) friends. Since I packed my stuff already, I can't transfer the last-moment-pictures to my laptop. In the Netherlands I will make one more post, than I will upload the last memorial moments.
Anyway, as for today's topics, Kamakura and Shirakawa. Last weekend I went to Shirakawa. Kamakura was from a few weeks ago, for some weird reason I haven't posted anything about it yet.

Since its getting late and I need to catch a very early train tomorrow, I will have to keep things short. Fist topic will be Kamakura, for this palce I had a very tight planning again. Taking a train at around 8:00 AM in the morning, arriving at around 9:20 AM at Kamakura. There a quick long walk towards Kencho-ji, most important Zen temple. And also had a quick look at a Shrine deplaying some evil god, King of Hell (Enno-ji). But before these two places I happened to pass the most important Shrine, Hachiman-gu.
After these three place, besides a long walk back, it was another long wak towards Zuisen-ji, a temple famous for it's gardens. On the way I also visited Kamakura-gu (shrine).
After these locations, still before mid-day, a long walk back towards Kamakura station, there to hop on some private railway towards the famous Great Budha of Kamakura. But before that I checked Hase-dera, temple for the Goddes of Mercy (Kannon temple). Also had lunch at this temple. So after the lunch was the Great Budha. Quick pictures and back to the private railway to go towards the sacred island Enoshima.
At Enoshima the weather turned bad, noticed that the area was a real wind-surfing area. Quick check of the island and pictures and that was my Kamakura trip. Here are the pictures:
http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/v42/moonlight2002/Kamakura/

Now the last topic (really tired now, no time to recheck post for typ mistakes). First of all, thank you Hirabayashi-san for the reservations. Thanks to him I was able to take the highway bus towards Takayama. 7:00 AM leave Shinjuku nad arrive at 13:30 at Takayama. Spent the rest of my day there. Walking around, checking some temples and enjoy an onsen (not natural). At Takayama I stayed at an temple inn, was very interesting. There I met a Belgium guy and an Australian guy, had dinner together with them. No drinking, cause the next day I had to wake up very early for the second bus-trip towards Shirakawa.
Again Hirabayashi-san made reservations for this part of the trip. I joined a Japanese day tour to Shirakawa, enjoyed the traditional Gassho houses. Too bad I was only able to see the tourist area, really would have like to see the real village part of that area.

Anyway, this is where I end my post. As always, thanks for the replies all, really appreciate it. Special thanks to Yuji from Tokyo for finding my blog and your reply. Really nice meeting you (twice) at Kizaki. Best of Luck!

Here are the remaining picutre links for this post:
http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/v42/moonlight2002/Takayama/
http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/v42/moonlight2002/Shirakawa/