Kyoto: the sights and sounds

In one word: wow. Now let me explain...

On Saturday I got to my first temple at 8.45am (don't worry, I've not had a personality transplant), which turned out to be a good idea for two reasons - it wasn't too hot yet (only about 28 degrees!) and it wasn't too busy yet. After walking up a little hill, lined with gift shops, I reached the entrance of Kiyomizu-dera.


Most of the buildings in this temple are 400 years old, although there has been a temple there since the 7th century.


The main building is built on giant slits and sits on the hillside.


Its famous for its sacred springs (mizu is Japanese for water), which are meant to have healing powers. I drank some but I can't say I've felt the benefits yet...


I also came across this crowd, no idea why they're wearing bibs:



I later found out that I picked a good day to visit Kiyomizu-dera - apparently if you went on that Saturday, you get the same spiritual benefits as going for 1000 days! After wandering around the area for a while I headed down some brilliant old streets (I later found out that this is the Lonely Planet's recommended path) towards my next temple. On the way, I bumped into these two:




They looked even more beautiful in real life. I can't even begin to imagine how uncomfortable they must have been though, it was about 30 degrees by this point and they were wearing so many layers! The heat in Kyoto was unbearable - weather reports said it was 33 degrees, but with about 50% humidity and not a cloud in the sky, it felt more like 40 degrees. I thought I was about to spontaneously combust on a number of occasions.

Yasaka-jinja was the next shrine I visited, and there was actually some sort of service being held inside, so I couldn't go into the main bit. There were so many lanterns hanging from one of the buildings.




I then hopped on the bus to Ginkaku-ji (the Silver Pavilion), which was a bit confusing as you get on through the back door and pay on your way out... This was one of my favourite temples at it had immaculate gardens - there were people employed to sweep any fallen leaves off the moss on the hillside, that's how beautifully kept the grounds were.




I then walked along the 'Philosopher's Path' towards Nanzen-ji. This two-kilometer long river-side path is a beautiful way to get between temples and is lined with cherry blossom trees that must look incredible in Spring.

I was impressed by the inside of Nanzen-ji as they still have all the original wood panels and painted sliding doors that have been there for centuries.




I spent the rest of the afternoon essentially getting lost. Kyoto is a wonderful city to get lost in - it's a brilliant mix of old, winding streets lined with traditional buildings and syscrapers and shopping malls. I spent most of the afternoon wandering around Nishiki Food Market and indulging in some retail therapy (my excuse is that I needed to go into the shops to cool down...). It turns out that I have some sort of homing signal as I managed to shop myself back to within 20 yards of my ryokan without even realisng it!

I woke up on Saturday to discover that a monsoon had descended on the city. This didn't put me off sightseeing though and actually helped to cool down the air a bit. Unfortunately, the rain added to the humidty, offsetting any good it had done by making everything damp and sticky. It also made taking photos very difficult as I kept getting tiny water droplets on my lense everytime I pointed the camera up, which was generally where everything I wanted to take a photo of was. Oh well.

I got the bus to Kinkaku-ji, or 'The Golden Pavilion'. This temple is incredible - it sits in the middle of an ancient, man-made pond and is completely covered in gold leaf. When it's sunny, it must be blinding to look at!


My next stop, Ryotoku-ji, was a short walk away. It is famous for its really old zen garden:


I thought that these trees were pretty cool, too:



I then walked further out and went to visit Ninna-ji - this was my favourite temple of the day because I wanted to move into the palace part of it. This is a series of beautiful, old Japanese buildings that are all connected by open walkways and surrounded by perfect bonsai and zen gardens.




Within the temple complex (it covers a huge area), there are loads of other buildings and shrines, including a five-storey pagoda.



The last pace I had time to visit before catching the shinkansen back was Nijo-jo (Nijo Castle). This castle sits in the centre of Kyoto (much like Edinburgh Castle) and is surrounded by ridiculously tall and thick granite walls and a moat. The inside of the palace was amazing, but they didn't let me take any photos :( All of the painted walls, ceilings and screen doors remain intact, as do all the paper walls and carved wooden decorations. The best part that has survived has to be the the 'nightingale floor' that encircles all of the rooms. This floor quietly sqeaks whenever you step on it - it doesn't make a wooden creaking noise, it actually almost sings, hence the name. I thought it was brilliant that it still works perfectly (I have no idea how the noise is created) and it made for fantastic background noise with everyone walking around the palace and looking into the rooms.

Where to start...

This weekend has been so incredible, I honestly don't even know where to start!

My ryokan was amazing.
The food was some of the best I've eaten so far.
Kyoto's temples are stunning.
The climate was the hottest I've ever experienced - I got sunburnt whlist wearing factor 50+ sunscreen... THAT'S how hot it was.
The shinkansen train travelled at ridiculous speeds.
And I missed the earthquake in Tokyo this evening that hit 4.0 on the richter scale.

I'm absolutely gutted about the last one - I secretly want to experience a little (not a big one, please!) earthquake while I'm staying in Japan, so I can't believe I was away the weekend Tokyo got one. Apparently buildings moved a bit!

As a result of spending the last two days running around Kyoto, I'm absolutely shattered and will blog properly about my weekend tomorrow. After I've uploaded my rather large collection of photos :)

The (inadvertent) intrepid explorer

It was pouring with rain when I got up on Sunday, so I decided to properly escape Tokyo this time and head for the countryside to try to get away from the bad weather. So I got the train to Kamakura - a rural town about 50 miles south-west, down the coast from Tokyo.

I got there just in time for lunch and hopped into a wee place near the station as the food looked good.


I ordered a set with tempura (prawn and assorted veggies), udon noodles in broth, rice and assorted pickles. Everything was great, and as expected, apart from the rice. I thought I'd ordered a set that came with plain rice but it turned up covered in tiny wee white fish - there were a lot of little eyes staring at me from my bowl...


After polishing my baby fish off, I got the wee electric train further into Kamakura to start my epic temple-hopping. I started of at Hasedera, which is famous for having beautiful grounds and thousands of tiny statues of Jizo.


There is a system of small caves in the hillside, where statues of various gods have been carved out of the walls:


And even smaller statues are placed next to one of them:


It was all absolutely stunning but very sad too - Jizo is the patron of departed children and all the statues have been left by women who have lost children through miscarriage or abortion. The main temple was huge and housed a 9m tall, gilded Buddha (of the standing, skinny variety), but I wasn't allowed to take photos inside :( So here's one of the outside for you.


After wandering around the temple grounds for a while, I headed off to Daibutsu, which is famous for its giant bronze Buddha (this time sitting down and chubby).


I also climbed inside it (from under his bum) to see what he looked like from the inside. Unsurprisingly, it looked like an inside-out, bronze Buddha. It was here that I tried to join the 'Daibutsu Hiking Course'. Now I thought that this would be a nice woodland path that meandered through the hillside forest, connecting the temples and shrines. How wrong I was.

The 'Daibutsu Hiking Course' is aptly named - it should definitely not be attempted at 3 in the afternoon, when it has been raining, while wearing plimsoles and carrying a rather large handbag. Oh, and when it's hot as hell and approximately 100% humidty. The part of the hike from Daibutsu to the nearest temple was supposed to take 20 minutes - it took me the best part of a hour. The path (if you can even call it that...) went steeply up and even more steeply down, was covered in inch-thick, very slippery mud and pretty much felt like I was trekking through a tropical jungle. And the signposts were only in Japanese. The jungle was beautiful but I was so hot and grumpy that I didn't take any pictures until I reached the closest temple. Sasuke-inari jinja has lots of red torii leading up the steps towards the main temple and also has hundreds of statues and figurines of foxes.



I then headed, on the road this time, to Zeniarai-benten. I entered this shrine complex through a tunnel in the hillside which opened out into a gorgeous clearing. This shrine is famous for its natural springs, which run out through caves under the hillside.


I collected some candles insense and a basket from the main building and headed towards the cave - I lit my candles off others, then lit my insense off them, popped my loose change into the basket and made my way to the caves. It's believed that if you wash your money in the springs and then spend it, it will return to you many times over.


So I spent a little at the shrine, praying for financial success and spent the rest on food! I got the food at a wee town fete sort of affair that I stumbled across on my way back to the train station. I got some fried noodles and yakitori from this massive charcoal grill:


My timing was perfect - as soon as I had finished my food and made it onto the platform, the weather caught up with me and it started to pour.