Ukimido Pavilion

This guide to Ukimido Pavilion in Nara Park opens by debunking its own name: the hexagonal cypress-bark hall does not float, it stands on six wooden pillars driven into the mud of Sagi-ike pond, with the still water doing the rest of the illusion. It traces the pavilion back to 1916, when Nara built its first Western-style public park and raised this hall beside a small vermillion bridge, the Horaibashi. You'll hear how time treated that timber over the decades that followed. Stand at the water's edge to watch the reflection do its work.