Thursday, June 27th 2013 - Kyoto, Round 2

Today we wanted to see the Fushimi Inari Taisha shrine grounds. It is famous for having approximately 10,000 torii gates (literally!) and a lot of stone foxes. It sounded like a bit of a hike, so our plan was to get up early and catch the first bus out there before it got hot and crowded. Turns out it is very hard to convince yourself to get up early when you are on vacation. We left around 9:30. We stopped at a conbini to get a few shrine-viewing pan because every day before this, we say that we'll just grab some conbini food when we get to the shrine and there is never a conbini near the shrine. We decided to be smart this time (so of course the first thing we saw off the bus was a Lawson).

Fushimi Inari is at the foot of Mt. Inari, but the bus ride was only about 20min. The admission is free and there are many shops selling cute fox goods if you so desire. The million-billion torii gates starts almost immediately and everyone wants to take their picture in the tunnel of gates. Do not wait in line to take a picture here. The entire mountain is torii gates, you will find numerous other picture opportunities if you plan on hiking the whole path. Which you should. It is a unique and beautiful Japanese experience and it counts as exercise! It is not for the weak of heart or leg, however. It is on a mountain, remember, so a large part of your experience involves stone steps. It's the original stair climber. When we completed the trail (and prayed at approximately 6,000 fox shrines), Mc found a sign that said the total trail is about 8K or around 5 miles. That's right, five miles of stairs. For our dear friends the O family, I'm sure that is nothing, but for the Mc family it was an impressive feat and we were definitely glad we waited to do that one till that last day.

On our way back down to the bus stop, we stopped at a little restaurant called Nezameya and I highly recommend it! It is right across the street from a big hashi (chopstick) shop, closer to the bus stop than the shrine on the south side of the street. Not only do they have an English menu and delicious, reasonably-priced food (we ate for less than 800¥ each), but it was founded in 1540 and not a lot of Americans get the opportunity to eat in a restaurant that has been in business for 400 years. I had oyakodon (chicken and egg over rice) and Mc had tamago soba (egg and noodles in hot soup) and even though it was quite warm outside, the hot food was very good.

We were pretty tired after our hike and the urge to take a nap was strong, however there was one more shrine I wanted to go to and since it was already 2pm I was worried it would close soon. So we rode back to Kyoto station bought our shinkansen ticket back to Tokyo for the next day, and hopped on the bus to the Sanjusangendo.

*SuperNova Travel Tip: Buy your Shinkansen (bullet train) ticket in advance if possible. The ticket counter agents speak great English and if you chooe to go the reserved seat route (about 600¥ more per person), then you can guarantee yourself a window seat - be sure to ask to be on the Mt. Fuji side!

Sanjusangendo is just about the only famous shrine that is within walking distance of Kyoto station. However, it's not a lovely walk and it was very hot, so we decided to make the most of our all-day bus pass. This shrine is my favorite. It's a huge building (sanjusan means 33 and gendo means the space between architectural pillars) filled with 10,000 hand-carved statues. Because they are all hand-carved, each one is unique. It is quiet and peaceful and you are not allowed to take pictures inside which forces you to just enjoy the experience. As we left the main hall, the afternoon sun was streaming through the windows and the quiet calm was the perfect way to end the day. Because we weren't allowed to take pictures, this temple is one you are going to have to experience for yourself.

When we got back to the hostel, we did take a short nap before trekking out to have dinner in a restaurant our last night in Kyoto. We went to Donguri, which I chose because Mc had not yet tried okanomiyaki. Okanomiyaki is difficult to describe; it's basically a big dinner pancake you cook yourself on a griddle. They all have the same base - cabbage, egg, and batter - and then you can order different types of other ingredients. We chose a seafood one and a beef one. Unfortunately, at this chain they do not let you cook your own okinomiyaki, they bring it to you cooked and slide it onto your table grill to stay hot. This was disappointing as I wanted Mc to have the experience of cooking it himself at the table like I did the first time I had okonomiyaki. However, he still got to try a new food. (I recommend the seafood variety and it's always better with a beer.)

Okonomiyaki at Donguri

Off to Tokyo tomorrow to visit our friend IB!

Monday, June 24th 2013 - Shinkansen to Kyoto!

Monday morning we said good-bye to the N family. S had to to work (in Japan, teachers still have to report to work most days in the summer) and take A-kun to daycare (N-sensei was staying home with Y-chan who was still a touch under the weather). So we all got up early and hugged and Mc and I made them promise to visit us in America when Y-chan was old enough. I miss S a lot, but am comforted by the thought that we will continue to communicate through letters/packages (and I have already sent the kids more Pop Rocks) and the knowledge that they are planning on visiting us some day.

We took the train from Higashi-Omiya to Tokyo Station so we could buy shinkansen (bullet train) tickets to Kyoto. Kyoto is one of the old capitals of Japan and is the home to approximately a million-billion ancient shrines. If you go to Japan and you have the time, you should go to Kyoto, it's good for your culture. When you go, you will want to take the bullet train because Kyoto is far and the shinkansen is FAST and you can take a plane anywhere but the bullet train is only in Japan. Buying tickets is easy as the ticket people in Tokyo Station speak pretty good English, so no excuses! When you buy tickets, you have the option of paying extra for assigned seating, which we did because 2 hours is a long time to stand up with your luggage if you can't find a seat.

*SuperNova Travel Tip: When you visit Japan from another country like the US, you are eligible to buy a Japan Rail Pass. You have to buy them in your home country before you leave on your trip. You pay a set fee for the pass and then when you arrive in Japan you can use the pass like a Suica for pretty much all the useful trains, even the bullet train to Kyoto, as much as you want for 7 days (or 14 days depending on which pass you buy). However, we discovered that in Japan they don't really do the "buy more, pay less" thing. If you see a double pack of something, it will be exactly twice the price as the regular amount. They have sales in Japan, but besides that, everything pretty much costs what it costs. It does not generally save you much to buy more (which is a foreign concept in the US). So make sure before you go through the process of obtaining a Rail Pass that it's worth it. You definitely need to take at least 3 big trips to make the 7 day pass worth the cost (for example, one of your airport trips, Kyoto, and Hiroshima). Mc and I don't travel that way - I don't like to cram a lot of big trips in a few days because then you can't ever get a feel for a place - and so after some careful research (and a lot of hypothetical train mapping on jorudan.com http://www.jorudan.co.jp/english/norikae/) we discovered it would not in fact save us any money to get the passes. It's an awesome deal if you have a short amount of time and want to see things that are not close together. Here's the website if you want to look into it further http://www.japanrailpass.net/eng/en001.html

The shinkansen is awesome and another reason to go to Kyoto! We were on the N700 (which goes 170mph), but we later discovered while looking at train goods (of course they made the shinkansen into a cute character with tons of products, quit pretending to be surprised) that one of the trains is named Dr. Yellow! Why do any of them have boring names like N700 if names like Dr. Yellow are an option?!  Anyway, taking the shinkansen is like riding an old-fashioned murder mystery train (except super-modern and less death). There are bathrooms and smoking cars, ladies who push food carts down the aisles, and a real train ticket guy in a fancy uniform complete with gloves who comes along and punches your ticket! OK, it's a stamp, but he makes a punching motion with it . . . Anyway, I love the shinkansen and I believe Mc is a fan now too.

Kyoto station is HUGE. When you arrive, find the information desk. Be careful, because there are several - one for train information, one just for information about the station itself and the attached mall, etc. - so make sure you find the one for tourist information. We didn't know what we wanted to do yet, so I just walked up to the man at the counter with a big smile and asked if he had any information in English for Kyoto and Nara, which he did. Before we ventured out of the station, I went to the bathroom. As I walked back to Mc, a woman came running after me and I realized I'd left my purse in the bathroom and the woman saw it and chased me down (did I mention how safe Japan is?). After that, we hauled out the map the hostel had emailed us before we left and started off to find K's House.

Mc found K's House on tripadvisor.com and the reviews were excellent. Even though it was a hostel, it offered private double rooms so we went ahead and booked it. It was pretty easy to find, a 10 min. walk from the station. As hostels go, it was good - it was very large with 2 communal rooms with kitchens, there was always an English speaker at the front counter, they had a restaurant/bar next door, the rooms had A/C, and the shared bathrooms had consistent hot water. However, our room was extremely small, just a touch wider than the bed, and the walls were very thin (I could clearly hear our neighbor having a looooong conversation in French at 2am). But it was cheap and we're not fancy and so it was fine for our 5 day trip.

Once checked in, we unpacked a little (very little, there was zero room for extraneous things outside the luggage) and started to read the literature we'd picked up from the information office as well as the Kyoto pages I'd copied from our Japan travel guide. It was late afternoon, but the day was not over, and we decided to head to Ponto-cho, which I read was a geisha district and a lovely night walk. In order to get there, we needed to take the subway from Kyoto Station to Shijo Station. There are only 2 subway lines in Kyoto; east-west and north-south. However, the underground area goes on forever. We got to our stop with no problem, but finding the ground level again was another matter. There was definitely a point at which I mentally prepared myself for a life underground and wondered if the mole people were an accepting bunch. We eventually surfaced at a shopping mall. Usually, Mc is pretty good with directions and a map, and if we had just walked out of the station he would have been set. But since we walked so far underground, when we finally found ground-level, we were a little turned around. So Mc picked a direction that seemed right to him and off we went. We happened upon the Nishiki Food Market entirely by accident, which ran into the shopping arcade, and both were pretty cool. We saw Nishiki Tenman-gu Shrine, which was an odd shrine that had a few animatronic features that I found more spooky than anything else.

Having found the shopping street on our map, we headed off in the direction of Ponto-cho. Then we came to a major street and looked at the map and we were not where we thought we were. So we set off again. And again. We did this for a while, looking for a geisha-style area. What we finally figured out was that Ponto-cho was not a street, but a sandy path by the river. Eye roll.

*SuperNova Travel Tip: What you read in travel guides may not match what you find in person. It's OK. Roll with it, most of the time you find neat things along the way. Or, if it's a total bust, it usually turns out to be a good story.

Once we found what we were looking for, we started to look for a restaurant for dinner. We found one down a little alley that claimed to have an English menu (I forgot to write down the name, but it was down the first alley past the start of the path) and we went inside. It was only 6pm, so it was too early for the Japanese, but we were starving and they were open. We removed our shoes and sat at the bar which was . . . um, let's see. Have I mentioned the holes in the floor in restaurants in Japan? OK, so the floor is built up high and then there are rectangular pits built into the floor. Then there are low rectangular tables slightly larger than the pits set on top of the pits. This is so you can still sit on the floor on zabuton (floor cushions), but you can put your legs under the table (instead of sitting on your knees). So the bar we sat at was like that - we sat on the floor with our legs in a pit at a bar that the cooks were standing on the other side of. That might be hard to picture, but it's the best I can do.

Anyway, they brought us an English menu which was a touch vague. We got the "Kyoto style 3 plates" and "fried sticks - cheese, fish, pork . . . " (the ellipses was included in the menu) and Mc got a beer. Kyoto style 3 plates ended up being a long dish with 3 sections, one had daikon (white radish, Mario used to throw them in SuperMario 2) with mentaiko (teeny fish eggs), sweet pepper, and tofu with vegetables. Oh, and all of them were topped with a small pile of teeny-tiny fish called whitebait (most people don't even notice that they're fish, but if you look closely, you can see their itty-bitty eyeballs).  It's always good to try the local cuisine and we have no regrets, but no new favorites either. The fried sticks were a much bigger hit - a plate with several sticks delicately deep-fried; pork, fish, quail eggs (which were amazing; still soft in the center), sweet potato, zucchini, and a wedge of brie cheese. Since we were the only ones there we chatted a little with the cook and had an extremely pleasant time.

Kyoto style 3 plates and fried sticks

After dinner, we went back to Ponto-cho and walked along the river. Ponto-cho runs behind a large section of expensive restaurants. There were several couples sitting along the river, including an adorable school-girl and school-boy sitting very close together on the a bench, holding hands. In Japan, several of the rivers are paved, so the path was not terribly scenic. But I was in Kyoto with my love and could not be happier.