Kyoto with Ella - day two

The famous Fushimi Inari Shrine is only two stops away from our hotel by local train, so it was easy making our way there today (along with hundreds of other visitors).

This Shinto shrine is famous for its thousands of orange (officially vermillion) torii gates which straddle a network of trails behind the main Shrine building. The trails lead up to the sacred Mount Inari.

Ella and I were in charge of working out where to start.........

Fushimi Inari is dedicated to Inari the Shinto god of rice. Foxes are thought to be Inari's messengers. Foxes are a constant theme throughout the grounds of this shrine.

This is the second day that Ella has been doing the big step count in her Doc Martens - they are finally being worn in - and Mount Inari proves it!

The torii gates along the entire trail are donated by individuals and companies. The donor's name and the date of the donation are inscribed on the back of each gate.. Apparently the donation amount starts at around $4,000AUD for a smaller gate and increases to $10,000AUD for a large gate.

We found this small private shrine area halfway up the mountain and were intrigued to see people making offerings and prayers at their own family shrines. 

This shrine decoration was made from thousands (and thousands) of tiny origami paper cranes

Now to work out how to get down the mountain...........

We found our lunch at one of the restaurants on the 11th floor of Kyoto Station today - after raving to Ella that Kyoto Station is a world unto itself and worthy of at least a day's visit for its own sake. It was a great lunch (yakitori with side dishes)!

We headed back up to the city after our very late lunch and Ella and Rob were very patient while I took a good look at my fave Nomura Tailor, Kyoto's famous fabric store ...........

So they were very deserving of this matcha soft serve afterwards - one of Kyoto's best!!

We ended off the day with a shop at our next door supermarket. It's fun working out if what we're buying will be edible!!

Kyoto with Ella - day one

On our first morning in Kyoto Ella and I foraged for our breakfast at the supermarket next door. Somehow we resisted the rows of super fresh sushi on offer and stuck to buying our usual granola and yoghurt bowls - although it was fun having to use Google Translate to work out what was on offer. Is that yoghurt, tofu or custard???

This pic was definitely sushi.

We started the day slowly in our cosy little apartment, enjoying a take away coffee along with our breakfast bowls. Rob is still not back to his full energy levels so Ella and I set out on our own this morning to do some sightseeing in Kyoto. 

We took a 207 bus (easy!) and made our way to the beautiful Kiyomizu-dera (Buddhist) Temple in the tree covered hills of East Kyoto. Kiyomizu-dera was founded here in 780  and was added to the UNESCO World Heritage List in 1994. It's an amazing construction (built without the use of any nails) in the most amazing setting overlooking the city of Kyoto.

I have shot this same scene three times now - once in late Summer, once in Autumn and now in the dead of Winter. It changes so much with the seasons.

The main hall of the Kiyomizu-dera Temple is an awesome structure ..........

A visit to the Koyasu Pagoda at the far southern end of the temple grounds is said to bring about an easy and safe childbirth ?? .............

Walking up to and away from the temple, along the steep and busy laneways of the historic Higashiyama District is part of the fun of visiting this temple too.

We came back to the apartment afterwards, had a cup of tea and then set off again, this time with Rob as well. We caught a train this time - on the Karasuma Line - up to Shijo Station - right in the middle of downtown Kyoto.

We found our way to the historic Nishiki Markets - 5 blocks long in the middle of the city and jam packed full of shops and restaurants operated by families who've been part of the markets for generations.  

We had a wonderful lunch here - one of the best of the trip (big call??), certainly the most diverse: udon noodles, tempura eggs, corn, vegies and prawns, fried tofu, gyoza, Japanese style vegie filled pancakes .... it was wonderful!

Afterwards we walked to the Gion District and strolled along Hanami-koji Street, hoping to catch a glimpse of geiko (geisha) and maiko (apprentices) in their traditional kimonos - which didn't happen today. But it is a lovely old part of Kyoto to wander around with its preserved wooden houses and traditional tea houses.   

We came across Yasui Kompiragu, a Shinto shrine in this area. It's known for its big "power stone" which has become popular with young Japanese women who come to the shrine to perform the ritual  of crawling through a hole in the stone, a ritual said to break up a bad relationship or initiate a new one. I didn't take a photo of people doing this despite how interesting it looked - it seemed too intrusive!

Dusk was falling as we got closer to home (by bus) tonight but we thought we deserved a reward after our day of sightseeing!

From Tokyo to Kyoto

We said goodbye to Tokyo this morning and our perfect little hotel set up at Sotetsu Fresa Inn, Daimon. Our next stop on this Japan adventure is the ancient capital of Kyoto.

We'd booked Shinkansen tickets from Tokyo Station to Kyoto - a 460 klm journey taking just 2 hours 15 minutes by Japan's fast bullet train.

We saw a fair bit of snow approaching Kyoto from Nagoya.

We've booked a small apartment in Kyoto, a short walk from the station. It's nice to be able to stretch out a bit after after our "compact stay" in our Tokyo hotel........ and a bonus is that Ella can access her Netflix account here!!

We've got a shopping mall (Aeon Mall) next door and a Baskin & Robbins on tap.

We went for a long walk late this afternoon to give Ella a taste of this town .......

.... and Kyoto's Kamo-gawa river, looking very peaceful in the late afternoon light .....

Tokyo with Ella - day four

We were good tourists today and took Ella to see Tokyo's oldest (completed 628) Buddhist temple this morning - the Senso-ji in Asakusa, along with many thousands of other sightseers, but surprisingly few Western visitors amongst them (apart from us).

 

We took these pictures at the Thunder Gate (Kaminarimon) - the outer gate of Senso-ji and the symbol of Asakusa and the whole of Tokyo.

The 200metre pathway up to the temple is lined with shops selling traditional crafts and local snacks. The shopping street (Nakamise) has been in existence for hundreds of years, and it was very crowded today.

It is said that the incense smoke from this Jokora in front of the temple has healing properties. Rob made every effort to extract as much healing as he could out of it today as he has developed a bad head cold and was not feeling his best this morning.

The chanting inside the temple  reminded Ella of the AbFab episode when Edina turns to Buddhism (briefly).... Ella is a mine of Pop Culture references no matter the context!

We went looking for Kappabashi Dougu Street afterwards, the site of Tokyo's famous Kitchen Town, with stores selling kitchenware, restaurant supplies and resin food replicas. We found the street eventually but many of the stores had closed doors today, unfortunately - maybe a Monday thing??

A nice view of Tokyo Skytree from Kappabashi Dougu Street- the tallest structure in Japan and the second tallest in the world!

Rob went back to the hotel to rest after our morning of sightseeing. It was cold today (8oC max) and he was much better off staying warm and rested with his head cold taking hold. Ella and I voted to make our way back to Koenji again - our favourite Tokyo neighbourhood we've discovered so far. We only explored a few of Koenji's laneways in yesterday's visit - so we knew there was a lot more to see (and a lot more vintage shopping to be done).

We stopped mid afternoon at a very rustic little coffee shop in one of the laneways. It is quite an adventure for us working out what to order in these little places given the language barrier. It's definitely not a part of Tokyo that caters to many tourists, but Ella and I enjoyed the coffee at this tiny cafe - and the experience!

At this point in our coffee break Ella is considering whether she should sign up for the latest release of tickets for the Laneway Festival in Sydney on the 8th February!  Will she, won't she??

I loved the Bohemian aesthetic, evident in many of the shops and businesses lining the Koenji laneways.

Rob slept for 4 hours this afternoon but didn't feel like going out in the cold tonight for dinner. So Ella and I found ourselves a likely restaurant close by and ordered quite a few unknown dishes for ourselves - quite successfully we thought - our most adventurous meal so far: a spicy fish roe appetizer, gyoza, lotus root and mustard, smoky noodles and a tofu and ginger dish. We loved it!!

Rob ordered snacks from our local convenience store and a custard filled daifuku for dessert - feed a cold and starve a fever they say - hope that strategy works in this case!