Killer......MONKEYS?!

Here are some more pictures of our touring days! Monkey Mountain and the jigoku pictures are from our touring day on Friday! The first few pictures are from touring on Tuesday.

The Japan Sea

The youth on the team, all wearing our sunglasses! :)

Jonah - making faces on the bus!

Noah, holding up the Nagasaki statue!

 On Friday, we travelled to visit a Monkey Mountain and Hell... yes, that is what it translates to. Hell's is a group of hot springs called "Jigoku" in Japanese. Jigoku is the Japanese word for hell, and the hot  springs were named that because it is thought that the hot springs are as hot as hell.

I was slightly... concerned at the thoughts of walking in the midst of a bunch of hungry wild monkeys, but everyone reassured me that it was perfectly safe... as long as I didn't look the monkeys in the eye! Oh, what a comforting thought!
It turned out to be perfectly safe, and the monkeys were quite tame as they sat around picking bugs off of each other and lazily relaxing in the shade. All the references to killer monkeys and monkeys attacking are simply a narrative of my imaginations! :) It was a really unique and exciting experience though!

There it is... Monkey Mountain!!!

Roughly translated, this sign says, "Do not make eye contact with the monkeys or they will attack you! They may look cute and cuddly, but don't be fooled by their big eyes and adorable antics, these guys are killers!" :)

Courageously making our way to the monkey area...

I wasn't fooled by their innocent gazes!

AGH! Not the big eyes!!!

Feeding time!

Then it started to rain!

Notice the swastika... they did not originate in World War II, they have roots in Buddhism and other Asian religions.

Well, that's all I have time for now... I will post pictures of the jigoku soon! I still have a lot of catching up to do, but I will catch up soon! :)
God Bless!