Meditate on this

After tea and breakfast, we drove a short distance to Turtle Rock (a huge granite rock formation) 

and then a bit farther to begin our hike to a meditation temple, built into the side of a mountain.  

Its placement in the mountains is intended to bring people closer to heaven for their meditation.  

What a beautiful hike!  There are conifers with tiny pine cones and a green meadow filled with wildflowers and butterflies (and what I think may have been tiny bees).  

We also saw cows—and trash.  Trash is an issue here.  Our guide tells us that people are in the habit of just tossing their garbage on the ground, believing nature will take care of it.  That works if it’s something that is not plastic or metal, but so much of what we saw were plastic bottles and bags.  

The meditation temple is across a hanging bridge and at the top of a fairly steep set of stairs, with signs along the path leading up that provide Buddhist teachings on your arrival and return route.  

It was built in 2000 to look like an elephant in profile with the temple building as the head and the stairs that lead up to it as the trunk.  

The interior reminded me of some of the brightly colored quilts I’ve seen at the Quilt Festival.  

We all sat for a moment and meditated—what a serene spot to get quiet inside yourself.