Free weekends seem to be in short supply, and there is so much to see! I'd marked a map of landmarks to visit...had tried to roughly determine the lovliest yet still time-efficient routes between major sights...and Davin and I were off to Kyoto bright and early on a Saturday morning.It had been a while since I'd experienced the fabulous speed, comfort, and general awesomeness of the shinkansen (It is such good news that the U.S. is purchasing similar bullet trains for high-speed rail between L.A. and San Francisco...and I hope that's just a start). Splurging for the shinkansen over the local trains that I usually ride (which stop at every small town, mind you), we arrived in Kyoto in 1 hour, 18 minutes (traveling a distance of about 260 km). Amazing!
Our first stop was to Fushimi Inari-Taisha, a complex of shrines linked by tunnels of orange torii gates. There were foxes everywhere...because foxes are messengers to Inari (a god of grains/rice).
Pray for good harvest...
From Inari-Taisha, just southeast of the central station, we headed west to To-ji temple, the tallest temple in Japan with its five stories rising 57 meters into the hazy, sweltering sky. It was originally built in 794, but has burned down five times (the current structure was erected in 1643).
From the station area, we left our packs in a locker and boarded a bus for the northeastern edge of town, where the city ends and shrines and temples peek from the wooded hills. We walked up a souvenir-shop-lined stone street scattered with a mix of foreigners and Japanese students on field trips...and found Ginkaku-ji (The Silver Temple) under construction, but worth a look nevertheless, with its lush green surroundings and sweet rock/sand garden representing Mt. Fuji.
From Ginkaku-ji, we took a peaceful (except for achy feet) walk along Philosopher's Path, a tree-lined cement canal connecting a string of shrines in the area: Ginkaku-ji, Eikan-do, and Nazen-ji.
The shaded, back-alley cafes were tempting...especially this one (I may have drooled reading the sign):
But we kept a-walkin', savoring our daylight, and got to see this beautiful aqueduct before dark:
We took a subway back to the station to grab our stuff, another subway to check into our deliciously cheap hostel...then headed back out to the Sanjo Shopping Arcade area, to track down the Sunshine Cafe, where I ate this far-from-Japanese but excellent dish containing Mexican rice baked with tofu slabs, avocado slices, and a mound of cheese on top:
The city was possibly even more beautiful at night...if only we hadn't been so exhausted from our chock-filled day! After checking out a few shrine areas at night and grabbing a drink at a Irish pub, it was back to our hostel bunkbeds. The next day would be filled with more temple/shrine sightseeing...and monkeys. Monkeys were a must!
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