Sitting Buddha

The largest sitting Buddha in Asia is less than a mile from my friends' house. The other day I hiked up to see it. It was bigger than the one I saw in Thailand, which also claimed to be the biggest sitting Buddha in Asia. It's a really beautiful statue, and an active Buddhist holy site. It was much more beautiful than any other Buddhist site I have been to; so remote and peaceful. Here are the pictures.












Apparently, Smokey the bear has an Asian cousin. I love that the eyes are just a little bit more narrow than the Smokey I grew up with.



This picture is a little small, and you might not be able to see it, but ... the swastika is a sign of peace and serenity and there was a very large swastika on one of the buildings.

This was our first snow storm, and the sun had just come up to melt the snow away. I could have spent the whole day taking pictures. The architecture combined with the mountains was stunning.