Some places are beautiful and some photogenic. Sometimes the two are less than harmonious.
The Fushimi-Inari temple in Kyoto is a must see on the tourist calendar. A short, pleasant train ride from the main station and popular with tourists and locals, it is well frequented any day of the year. As with most temples in Japan, it is a working religious site as well as a nice place to be.
We arrived mid morning in spring to an already solid crowd and it was building. The temple area is spread across the face of a large hill, broken into several circuitous routes, allowing people to see some or all of the pathway as they wish. As we climbed higher the crowds thinned, but it was still nearly impossible to get an image of the hundreds of orange gates without an unwanted element in the frame and the light was at times harsh and too direct. Resorting to compression and tight detail, using a 75-300 at the short end and wide open (f4.8), I compressed the cold stone detail against an almost silk like wall of orange flame. The bokeh of the 75-300 is very nice for a slow zoom lens and it occasionally made/saved images on the trip.