Japan - Kyoto - Day 10

- Saturday, October 10th 2015 -

 Today was the day before we headed off to Koya-San for the Buddhist temple.  We had some time before really NEEDING to organize our bags, and there was one thing left that I really really wanted to do.  Fushimi Inari Shrine, known for having 1000 tori gates!

Getting there was pretty easy (I let Emma navigate) and it was literally right across the street from the station.  The place was very busy, but for being a huge facility anyway, it was fine!

Obligatory touristing photos!




















Ok honestly this is just 101 photos of tori gates and pretty shrine scenery, there will be commentary where I feel but enjoy the show.

Japan - Kyoto - Day 9

- Friday, October 9th 2015 -

This was probably my favorite day in Kyoto.  Our plan for the day was to head out to Arashiyama and see what happened.  We knew we wanted to visit the Monkey Park, but that was all we really had officially planned!
This next post is VERY picture heavy, there's like.. 70 photos.

ONWARD!

So, I'm not sure what I did to incur the wrath of Emma, but my first photo of the day was this;

 I do remember her being very unamused with me.  Which does make me think we had the Irish Pub last night, as usually she's unamused when I make her get out of bed.  This day I'm 99% sure was one of the days she was dragging, and I'm my usual "I'M UP! I FEEL NOTHING!" attitude (in reality I do sometimes feel draggy in the morning,  Just not often.)

A couple of train transfers later, we arrive at the Arashiyama station, which is decorated in anime and has a ton of adorable shops right at it (and a foot bath).

of course I photograph the anime boys.

At the train station you're able to buy bike rentals (and other things) so we bought a bike rental for about $10 and got a free footbath ticket with it.  The bikes didn't have to go back until  5pm so we had all day!

Pedaling on a bike that's got a strange setup compared to what you're used to is so much fun.  Basket in the front with all my things, more upright, and of course, crowded Japan!  WEEEEEE! Lots of giggling and minor screams happened.  Emma got bored with my leading slowly and eventually took over. Phhft.
We pedaled our way off to the Bamboo Forest!  Which, as warned, was teaming with people.  Still, it was really pretty and fun to ride though.

Super out of focus, oops.  Picked the wrong one to upload.

The bike locks on these things are brilliant.  You have a key and just move a little lever to lock the tires.  Super fast, efficient and easy.  Our first stop while bike riding was a little shrine called Nonomiya.

Of course I didn't hold still ever while photographing today. Go me.

It was small and cute, but we didn't explore all of it.  Wanting to hit the road again and see MOAR!  While bike riding we were approached by this one area who had keepers at all 3? or 4? entrances. All of them were friendly, and all of them tried to persuade us to go inside and spend $30 on seeing the grounds and 'a couple of sweets'. Bah! It did look lovely, but no thanks.

Wandering around more and not really having any direction, we came across some random birds!

You probably can't see them in this one, but in the full resolution one I have you can. We went down that road a little, but turned around and went another route. 

The other route took us to a lovely .... garden?  Honestly I have no idea where we ended up.  The sign wasn't in English.  Still, we paid the entry fee and went for what would end up being one of the prettiest walks I think we took!

The gate to 'wanna do it?'

After committing to the entrance fee. Which was only $5, and in my opinion, worth it!

Follow the cut, as there's lots of pretty garden photos coming up!...and monkeys.

Japan - Kyoto - Day 8

- Thursday, October 8th 2015 -

 Today takes a lot of effort for me to blog about.  It's not super crazy or chaotic, but it's one of the days that for some reason, I just don't want to write about.  So, apologies in advance if this one is dry and less fun than the other ones.  This was also I believe, the point I stopped blogging regularly on facebook.

We woke up at a decent time so we could conquer breakfast.  Unfortunately breakfast wasn't as good as I was hoping, as it was fairly traditional, meaning... lots and lots of pickled things and seaweed.  There were some interesting things like beef stew and curry for breakfast, but for the most part it was a total experiment and everything was, at most, lukewarm.  Considering we were paying 1000 yen ($10) per person per meal, I honestly don't think we ate what we were paying for.  Oh well.

Our tour guide came to get us at 9am.  Her name is Ms Noriko Sato, and she didn't speak the best English.  Still, we were able to ask her enough questions to get Kyoto sorted, and she soon led us away to begin our sight seeing tour.

Approaching the gates.  See all those yellow hats?

First up was Kinkaku-ji Temple, basically the Golden Pavilion.  If you google it, you'll see exactly what it was. Breath taking, beautiful, golden place.  It had an entry fee, and we had to charge Ms Sato's IC card (transport card), which meant today was going to be painful on our wallets.  Oh well!

Gardens! kinda looking a bit thirsty...

Unfortunately I don't have a billion photos of this place, there was a field trip going on with TONS of children.  They're well behaved, but in the way for any of those lovely pictures I tend to go for.  Still, I did manage to snap a few where there's not quite so many dozens of kids about.  Our tour guide wasn't a very big fan of children or tourists, and her patience seemed a bit low. Emma and I were fine with it, so? Kids are here to enjoy and see their culture, fine by me.  Tourists? Well, I'm a tourist as well!

Kinkaku-ji Temple

The temple is known for its crystal clear reflection in the lake, along with the beautiful gold leafing that covers its exterior.  Unfortunately it happened to be gardener day as well, so the gardeners were trimming the island detail/trees and shrubs placed all along.  I still think it's beautiful, and the gloomy skies made it even more beautiful.  The backside of this building has chains going up it and a little tower up by the phoenix on the top, lightning rod!

Obligatory tourist picture. I look pretty rough.

Coming up is some garden photos, Ryoan-ji Temple, and Ninna-ji Temple.  There are hundreds of temples and shrines in Kyoto, a lot of them being World Heritage Sites.  Which meant our tour guide got in for free, and we had to pay.  Nice that we didn't have to pay for her, but still, ow!  Some free sites are always appreciated...

Japan - Kyoto - Day 7

- Wednesday, October 7th 2015 -

We bid our farewell to Hakone today, making our way to Kyoto.  Once again using the Hakone Free pass and a bus, we arrived back to Odawara Station.  We took the Shinkansen Hikari, which is apparently a very very fast train, the ride being just over two hours long.  I even napped a bit on the ride, as most of the time we were in cities and watching out the windows there really tires your eyes.

While leaving Hakone though, and first boarding the train, you could see Mount Fuji beautifully.  The skies cleared up and the weather got warmer again. The train passed through many tunnels, leaving the mountainous scenery behind for awhile.  Finding our hotel was super easy, but we arrived at 1pm and check in wasn't until 2.  So, we left our luggage behind with the very helpful staff and went to find lunch.

Lacking my usual insane sweet tooth, I passed up the Apple Custard pastry displayed on the right of this picture and got a chicken breast massive sandwich.  Food was delicious and we had chocolate milk with icecream on it as our drinks.  They even give free toasted bread out with a ordered drink, and that was tasty as well!  Emma getting her usual cola, and I went for a delicious Vietnamese cinnamon coffee with whipped cream on top.

The location of this hotel, the Daiwa Roynet Hotel was amazing.  There was a Lawsons, 7-11, and the train station within a stones throw of where we were at!  Our forwarded luggage was there waiting for us so when we came back after lunch and got checked in, everything was ready for us!  Emma had done a quick outfit change, as Hakone had been cold and Kyoto was very toasty.  With still a few hours of daylight left, we pulled open the map and chose a place that was 'close'.

Well.  Kyoto maps are deceiving, what looks close is actually pretty far.  And I'm directionally  challenged.  We decided to go to the Nijo Castle. Which should have been "Just up the road".  We took a rather indirect route, and made a note that this was why there were buses.  We still didn't end up really braving buses.  Probably not a bad decision since it's not like we hadn't walked a lot yet that day, and there's a flat fare fee of 260 yen per ride.  Adds up when you're not going far, which unfortunately, we often didn't go far (we had to just change stations or whatnot).

Anyway.  We arrived about an hour before closing time, and as we walked in they were doing last call for the actual castle entry.  So we made a B-line for that and got to explore the very pretty little castle.  Information was bilingual, if not trilingual most of the time so we could read and find out what things were about, unfortunately photography wasn't allowed inside of the castle.

The details around the castle were breath taking. This decorating one of the arch ways to get into the grounds.

Above is the entryway to the castle that you can't photograph inside of.

Follow the cut for the gardens