A Little Walk

 It's July, and I actually went for a walk and enjoyed it!

It's hot, the temperature right now is 29C, earlier it was up to 34C, but the humidity is low, about 50%. That might sound high, but the humidity is usually in the 80s.

Yesterday evening, I noticed that outside was cooler than inside. I'd been out picking a few blueberries. I suggested to Hannah that we have a little walk. I planned to walk up to our land, just to see how bad it is! Hannah had a quick look at Google Maps and found a small shrine just behind our house. But because of the stream, we had to walk around the block to get to it. According to Google Maps, it would take about 10 minutes to get there. I still want to know who does the walking for Google Maps, as I think they have longer legs than I do!

The worst part of this little walk was walking on the main road, just a couple of minutes, but there is no place to walk, and cars tend to go by really fast. Also, this was about 6pm, so people are heading home after work.  Once we got off that road, it was really nice! The air was fresh, the scenery so wild and beautiful, lovely mountain views, and stunning cloud formations!

Walking toward the shrine

I think the cage on the right is for trash pickup!

Rather wild!

This was actually an overgrown house. Hannah went up to it and could see the house under the foliage. Interesting and a bit creepy. I'm amazed at how nature just claims back everything. You would think that with all the man-made material used in a standard house that nothing could grow over it, but given time, nature finds a way!

Shipping container

The first question that comes to mind is why, the second is how?  It's just left there. I would love to know what's inside. 

The tori gate

This marks the entrance to the shrine itself.

Writings on the gate

I'm not sure what these writings are, either who made it or who paid for it.

It does say the date that the gate was erected, Showa 11, 1936. So old but not ancient!

Community center

Before we got to the shrine, we found this building. At first we thought it might be a private house but it's a community center. Hannah took some photos of the interior, which looks like it's still being used!

Inside the community center

Around the corner from the building was the shrine.

The shrine

There were even brooms and rakes stored underneath.

Brooms and rakes

So I guess somebody must come to keep the ground clear.

Beautiful old tree

The area was kept nice but not overly taken care of. A nice balance between keeping it safe and letting nature have her way!

I really enjoyed our little walk. Finding something that I didn't know about made it interesting and exciting.

I hope that I can have more of these little walks. If the weather stays like this, I might actually be able to enjoy the summer a bit. I hate that I feel confined to four walls for about half the year.  

Hannah is going back to her apartment tomorrow. I've enjoyed having her here, but she needs to get back to her schedule. 

We are thinking of going for a day trip during her summer holiday, something to look forward to.

But I do need to be able to walk a lot more to enjoy these outings. Back to doing more exercise!!