diff --git a/examples/vitess/README.md b/examples/vitess/README.md
index d2a5bbf1388..1794510d081 100644
--- a/examples/vitess/README.md
+++ b/examples/vitess/README.md
@@ -61,11 +61,36 @@ tune these requirements in the
 [resource limits](../../docs/user-guide/compute-resources.md)
 section of each YAML file.
 
-Lastly, you need to open ports 30000 (for the Vitess admin daemon) and 80 (for
+Lastly, you need to open ports 30000-30001 (for the Vitess admin daemon) and 80 (for
 the guestbook app) in your firewall. See the
 [Services and Firewalls](../../docs/user-guide/services-firewalls.md)
 guide for examples of how to do that.
 
+### Configure site-local settings
+
+Run the `configure.sh` script to generate a `config.sh` file, which will be used
+to customize your cluster settings.
+
+``` console
+./configure.sh
+```
+
+Currently, we have out-of-the-box support for storing
+[backups](http://vitess.io/user-guide/backup-and-restore.html) in
+[Google Cloud Storage](https://cloud.google.com/storage/).
+If you're using GCS, fill in the fields requested by the configure script.
+Note that your Kubernetes cluster must be running on instances with the
+`storage-rw` scope for this to work. With Container Engine, you can do this by
+passing `--scopes storage-rw` to the `glcoud container clusters create` command.
+
+For other platforms, you'll need to choose the `file` backup storage plugin,
+and mount a read-write network volume into the `vttablet` and `vtctld` pods.
+For example, you can mount any storage service accessible through NFS into a
+Kubernetes volume. Then provide the mount path to the configure script here.
+
+If you prefer to skip setting up a backup volume for the purpose of this example,
+you can choose `file` mode and set the path to `/tmp`.
+
 ### Start Vitess
 
 ``` console
@@ -79,7 +104,7 @@ something like this:
 ****************************
 * Complete!
 * Use the following line to make an alias to kvtctl:
-* alias kvtctl='$GOPATH/bin/vtctlclient -server 104.197.47.173:30000'
+* alias kvtctl='$GOPATH/bin/vtctlclient -server 104.197.47.173:30001'
 * See the vtctld UI at: http://104.197.47.173:30000
 ****************************
 ```
@@ -115,18 +140,6 @@ in Vitess. Each page number is assigned to one of the shards using a
 
 You may also want to remove any firewall rules you created.
 
-### Limitations
-
-Currently this example cluster is not configured to use the built-in
-[Backup/Restore](http://vitess.io/user-guide/backup-and-restore.html) feature of
-Vitess, because as of
-[Vitess v2.0.0-alpha2](https://github.com/youtube/vitess/releases) that feature
-requires a network-mounted directory. Usually this system is used to restore
-from the latest backup when a pod is moved or added in an existing deployment.
-As part of the final Vitess v2.0.0 release, we plan to provide support for
-saving backups in a cloud-based blob store (such as Google Cloud Storage or
-Amazon S3), which we believe will be better suited to running in Kubernetes.
-
 
 <!-- BEGIN MUNGE: GENERATED_ANALYTICS -->
 [![Analytics](https://kubernetes-site.appspot.com/UA-36037335-10/GitHub/examples/vitess/README.md?pixel)]()
diff --git a/examples/vitess/configure.sh b/examples/vitess/configure.sh
new file mode 100755
index 00000000000..6391b0db3d3
--- /dev/null
+++ b/examples/vitess/configure.sh
@@ -0,0 +1,73 @@
+#!/bin/bash
+
+# Copyright 2015 The Kubernetes Authors All rights reserved.
+#
+# Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License");
+# you may not use this file except in compliance with the License.
+# You may obtain a copy of the License at
+#
+#     http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
+#
+# Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
+# distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
+# WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
+# See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
+# limitations under the License.
+
+# This script generates config.sh, which is a site-local config file that is not
+# checked into source control.
+
+# Select and configure Backup Storage Implementation.
+storage=gcs
+read -p "Backup Storage (file, gcs) [gcs]: "
+if [ -n "$REPLY" ]; then storage="$REPLY"; fi
+
+case "$storage" in
+gcs)
+  # Google Cloud Storage
+  project=$(gcloud config list project | grep 'project\s*=' | sed -r 's/^.*=\s*(.*)$/\1/')
+  read -p "Google Developers Console Project [$project]: "
+  if [ -n "$REPLY" ]; then project="$REPLY"; fi
+  if [ -z "$project" ]; then
+    echo "ERROR: Project name must not be empty."
+    exit 1
+  fi
+
+  read -p "Google Cloud Storage bucket for Vitess backups: " bucket
+  if [ -z "$bucket" ]; then
+    echo "ERROR: Bucket name must not be empty."
+    exit 1
+  fi
+  echo
+  echo "NOTE: If you haven't already created this bucket, you can do so by running:"
+  echo "      gsutil mb gs://$bucket"
+  echo
+
+  backup_flags=$(echo -backup_storage_implementation gcs \
+                      -gcs_backup_storage_project "'$project'" \
+                      -gcs_backup_storage_bucket "'$bucket'")
+  ;;
+file)
+  # Mounted volume (e.g. NFS)
+  read -p "Root directory for backups (usually an NFS mount): " file_root
+  if [ -z "$file_root" ]; then
+    echo "ERROR: Root directory must not be empty."
+    exit 1
+  fi
+  echo
+  echo "NOTE: You must add your NFS mount to the vtctld-controller-template"
+  echo "      and vttablet-pod-template as described in the Kubernetes docs:"
+  echo "      http://kubernetes.io/v1.0/docs/user-guide/volumes.html#nfs"
+  echo
+
+  backup_flags=$(echo -backup_storage_implementation file \
+                      -file_backup_storage_root "'$file_root'")
+  ;;
+*)
+  echo "ERROR: Unsupported backup storage implementation: $storage"
+  exit 1
+esac
+
+echo "Saving config.sh..."
+echo "backup_flags=\"$backup_flags\"" > config.sh
+
diff --git a/examples/vitess/env.sh b/examples/vitess/env.sh
index 710cf343ea1..efb276a0c15 100644
--- a/examples/vitess/env.sh
+++ b/examples/vitess/env.sh
@@ -21,7 +21,7 @@
 KUBECTL=${KUBECTL:-kubectl}
 
 # This should match the nodePort in vtctld-service.yaml
-VTCTLD_PORT=${VTCTLD_PORT:-30000}
+VTCTLD_PORT=${VTCTLD_PORT:-30001}
 
 # Customizable parameters
 SHARDS=${SHARDS:-'-80,80-'}
@@ -53,3 +53,11 @@ get_vtctld_addr() {
   echo "$VTCTLD_ADDR"
 }
 
+config_file=`dirname "${BASH_SOURCE}"`/config.sh
+if [ ! -f $config_file ]; then
+  echo "Please run ./configure.sh first to generate config.sh file."
+  exit 1
+fi
+
+source $config_file
+
diff --git a/examples/vitess/guestbook-controller.yaml b/examples/vitess/guestbook-controller.yaml
index cece7e232d8..1c5ca5a18b8 100644
--- a/examples/vitess/guestbook-controller.yaml
+++ b/examples/vitess/guestbook-controller.yaml
@@ -12,7 +12,7 @@ spec:
     spec:
       containers:
         - name: guestbook
-          image: vitess/guestbook:v2.0.0-alpha3
+          image: vitess/guestbook:v2.0.0-alpha5
           ports:
             - name: http-server
               containerPort: 8080
diff --git a/examples/vitess/vitess-up.sh b/examples/vitess/vitess-up.sh
index 888230ba354..b38d7567dcb 100755
--- a/examples/vitess/vitess-up.sh
+++ b/examples/vitess/vitess-up.sh
@@ -74,7 +74,7 @@ fi
 export KUBECTL='kubectl'
 
 echo "Downloading and installing vtctlclient..."
-go get github.com/youtube/vitess/go/cmd/vtctlclient
+go get -u github.com/youtube/vitess/go/cmd/vtctlclient
 num_shards=`echo $SHARDS | tr "," " " | wc -w`
 total_tablet_count=$(($num_shards*$TABLETS_PER_SHARD*$num_cells))
 vtgate_count=$VTGATE_COUNT
@@ -105,7 +105,7 @@ wait_for_running_tasks vtctld 1
 wait_for_running_tasks vttablet $total_tablet_count
 wait_for_running_tasks vtgate $vtgate_count
 
-vtctld_port=30000
+vtctld_port=30001
 vtctld_ip=`kubectl get -o yaml nodes | grep 'type: ExternalIP' -B 1 | head -1 | awk '{print $NF}'`
 vtctl_server="$vtctld_ip:$vtctld_port"
 kvtctl="$GOPATH/bin/vtctlclient -server $vtctl_server"
@@ -160,5 +160,6 @@ echo "****************************"
 echo "* Complete!"
 echo "* Use the following line to make an alias to kvtctl:"
 echo "* alias kvtctl='\$GOPATH/bin/vtctlclient -server $vtctl_server'"
-echo "* See the vtctld UI at: http://${vtctl_server}"
+echo "* See the vtctld UI at: http://${vtctld_ip}:30000"
 echo "****************************"
+
diff --git a/examples/vitess/vtctld-controller.yaml b/examples/vitess/vtctld-controller-template.yaml
similarity index 77%
rename from examples/vitess/vtctld-controller.yaml
rename to examples/vitess/vtctld-controller-template.yaml
index 0f86613725a..72fe245a212 100644
--- a/examples/vitess/vtctld-controller.yaml
+++ b/examples/vitess/vtctld-controller-template.yaml
@@ -12,12 +12,15 @@ spec:
     spec:
       containers:
         - name: vtctld
-          image: vitess/lite:v2.0.0-alpha3
+          image: vitess/lite:v2.0.0-alpha5
           volumeMounts:
             - name: syslog
               mountPath: /dev/log
             - name: vtdataroot
               mountPath: /vt/vtdataroot
+            - name: certs
+              readOnly: true
+              mountPath: /etc/ssl/certs
           resources:
             limits:
               memory: "128Mi"
@@ -35,13 +38,18 @@ spec:
               -log_dir $VTDATAROOT/tmp
               -alsologtostderr
               -port 15000
-              -service_map 'bsonrpc-vt-vtctl'
+              -grpc_port 15001
+              -service_map 'grpc-vtctl'
               -topo_implementation etcd
               -tablet_protocol grpc
               -tablet_manager_protocol grpc
-              -etcd_global_addrs http://$ETCD_GLOBAL_SERVICE_HOST:$ETCD_GLOBAL_SERVICE_PORT" vitess
+              -etcd_global_addrs http://$ETCD_GLOBAL_SERVICE_HOST:$ETCD_GLOBAL_SERVICE_PORT
+              {{backup_flags}}" vitess
       volumes:
         - name: syslog
           hostPath: {path: /dev/log}
         - name: vtdataroot
           emptyDir: {}
+        - name: certs
+          hostPath: {path: /etc/ssl/certs}
+
diff --git a/examples/vitess/vtctld-service.yaml b/examples/vitess/vtctld-service.yaml
index 5c8ba5935cf..70d619a873d 100644
--- a/examples/vitess/vtctld-service.yaml
+++ b/examples/vitess/vtctld-service.yaml
@@ -8,8 +8,13 @@ metadata:
 spec:
   ports:
     - port: 15000
+      name: web
       targetPort: 15000
       nodePort: 30000
+    - port: 15001
+      name: grpc
+      targetPort: 15001
+      nodePort: 30001
   selector:
     component: vtctld
     app: vitess
diff --git a/examples/vitess/vtctld-up.sh b/examples/vitess/vtctld-up.sh
index 6622d0cae2b..dd2a63b70de 100755
--- a/examples/vitess/vtctld-up.sh
+++ b/examples/vitess/vtctld-up.sh
@@ -25,7 +25,14 @@ echo "Creating vtctld service..."
 $KUBECTL create -f vtctld-service.yaml
 
 echo "Creating vtctld replicationcontroller..."
-$KUBECTL create -f vtctld-controller.yaml
+# Expand template variables
+sed_script=""
+for var in backup_flags; do
+  sed_script+="s,{{$var}},${!var},g;"
+done
+
+# Instantiate template and send to kubectl.
+cat vtctld-controller-template.yaml | sed -e "$sed_script" | $KUBECTL create -f -
 
 server=$(get_vtctld_addr)
 echo
diff --git a/examples/vitess/vtgate-controller-template.yaml b/examples/vitess/vtgate-controller-template.yaml
index 98f18d3e135..03c9665b2df 100644
--- a/examples/vitess/vtgate-controller-template.yaml
+++ b/examples/vitess/vtgate-controller-template.yaml
@@ -12,7 +12,7 @@ spec:
     spec:
       containers:
         - name: vtgate
-          image: vitess/lite:v2.0.0-alpha3
+          image: vitess/lite:v2.0.0-alpha5
           volumeMounts:
             - name: syslog
               mountPath: /dev/log
diff --git a/examples/vitess/vttablet-down.sh b/examples/vitess/vttablet-down.sh
index 9ce3d33b7d5..af739f277c1 100755
--- a/examples/vitess/vttablet-down.sh
+++ b/examples/vitess/vttablet-down.sh
@@ -41,12 +41,6 @@ for shard in `seq 1 $num_shards`; do
       uid=$[$uid_base + $uid_index + $cell_index]
       printf -v alias '%s-%010d' $cell $uid
 
-      if [ -n "$server" ]; then
-        echo "Removing tablet $alias from Vitess topology..."
-        vtctlclient -server $server ScrapTablet -force $alias
-        vtctlclient -server $server DeleteTablet $alias
-      fi
-
       echo "Deleting pod for tablet $alias..."
       $KUBECTL delete pod vttablet-$uid
     done
@@ -54,3 +48,4 @@ for shard in `seq 1 $num_shards`; do
   done
   let uid_base=uid_base+100
 done
+
diff --git a/examples/vitess/vttablet-pod-template.yaml b/examples/vitess/vttablet-pod-template.yaml
index bca3050e454..d3d097e8fcf 100644
--- a/examples/vitess/vttablet-pod-template.yaml
+++ b/examples/vitess/vttablet-pod-template.yaml
@@ -11,12 +11,15 @@ metadata:
 spec:
   containers:
     - name: vttablet
-      image: vitess/lite:v2.0.0-alpha3
+      image: vitess/lite:v2.0.0-alpha5
       volumeMounts:
         - name: syslog
           mountPath: /dev/log
         - name: vtdataroot
           mountPath: /vt/vtdataroot
+        - name: certs
+          readOnly: true
+          mountPath: /etc/ssl/certs
       resources:
         limits:
           memory: "1Gi"
@@ -70,9 +73,11 @@ spec:
           -db-config-filtered-charset utf8
           -enable-rowcache
           -rowcache-bin /usr/bin/memcached
-          -rowcache-socket $VTDATAROOT/{{tablet_subdir}}/memcache.sock" vitess
+          -rowcache-socket $VTDATAROOT/{{tablet_subdir}}/memcache.sock
+          -health_check_interval 5s
+          -restore_from_backup {{backup_flags}}" vitess
     - name: mysql
-      image: vitess/lite:v2.0.0-alpha3
+      image: vitess/lite:v2.0.0-alpha5
       volumeMounts:
         - name: syslog
           mountPath: /dev/log
@@ -118,4 +123,6 @@ spec:
       hostPath: {path: /dev/log}
     - name: vtdataroot
       emptyDir: {}
+    - name: certs
+      hostPath: {path: /etc/ssl/certs}
 
diff --git a/examples/vitess/vttablet-up.sh b/examples/vitess/vttablet-up.sh
index 8b4bff61873..98556c27c8e 100755
--- a/examples/vitess/vttablet-up.sh
+++ b/examples/vitess/vttablet-up.sh
@@ -55,7 +55,7 @@ for shard in $(echo $SHARDS | tr "," " "); do
 
       # Expand template variables
       sed_script=""
-      for var in alias cell uid keyspace shard shard_label port grpc_port tablet_subdir tablet_type; do
+      for var in alias cell uid keyspace shard shard_label port grpc_port tablet_subdir tablet_type backup_flags; do
         sed_script+="s,{{$var}},${!var},g;"
       done