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Japan - Tokyo & Kyoto
We have arrived in Japan in the Wet Season!! Why didn't anyone tell us! After a long flight from San Francisco we arrived at Narita Airport, collected our luggage and boarded a shuttle bus to take us to our hotel - 2 ½ hours later we arrived at Shinjuku Washington Hotel by many elevated freeways, Tokyo traffic was incredible!!
We walked around our local area - found the Takashimaya Department store and went up to the roof area where there are 3 floors of restaurants and outdoor gardens with views across the city -then caught the subway into the centre and walked around the gardens of the Imperial Palace. Lunch was a very cheap eat under the railway underpass (small liver, tongue & chicken skewers ) before finding a coffee. Our table companion was a sake maker and invited us to come to his shop and sample his sake - so we did!! It started to rain so we went home and ate at one of the 6 or 8 restaurants in the hotel.
The next morning we were on our way to Kyoto by bullet train or shinkansen, very quiet travel at about 200 k/hr, lots of elevated track and tunnels. Kyoto station is very modern with huge shopping centre and hotel attached. We took subway to our hotel which is in a good shopping area with some long streets that have been covered and look like large arcades, attractive clothing and food shops amongst shrines and other small businesses.
Next morning we went to Todai-ji Temple at Nara to see the Big Buddha. At Nara Station we met a school group from the Gold Coast whose guide was an Aus teacher who had taken many similar trips as their school had a sister school on the island of Hokkaido. They were all very friendly and invited us to join them. The temples and grounds were immense and it was good to have a guide and their company - the copper Buddha, 15 metres tall, was cast in 752 and was covered in gold leaf (tarnished now) and the temple was built around it later. One of the support posts of the temple has a hole cut in it the size of the Buddha 's nostril and school kids try and fit through- some of the Aussie girls had a go and got through! On our way back we went to Inari where there are thousands of Torii gates, all painted bright vermillion and winding their way up a mountain-side. There was a ceremony taking place when we arrived and there were many men (some women) dressed up in white robes with high black hats!
The last day at the hotel we took the hotel bikes out at 8.30 am and went to the Imperial Palace where we did the English tour, huge grounds and beautiful timber buildings around lovely small gardens with tranquil ponds. The roofs of some of the buildings appear to be thatched but they are actually made of eighty layers of Oregan bark with small bamboo pegs to hold it together. From here we cycled on to the Golden Pavilion, Rokuon-ji, the two storey timber building stands in a lovely small lake with landscaped garden around. When we returned to our bikes the map had disappeared and we were about 3 km from our hotel with no landmarks in sight. We tried for the direct route rather than retracing our much longer route, a mistake as our hotel was not in the centre and it was hard to get across to people where we wished to go(the Imperial Palace did not seem to mean anything to the locals), however everyone is helpful and we eventually got home about 2 pm!!
We then had to transfer to our Ryokan, a traditional Japanese hotel, no beds, sit on floor to eat, communal bathroom with traditional bathing ritual. We both went for a bath in the afternoon (after our long cycle!) and found we each had bath area to ourselves - it was so relaxing lying in a warm spa- type bath and feeling all the day's tensions slip away (Mal's hot bath was on the roof in the open air!) We were served a great 13 course meal in our room before two men came and made up our futon; we also had a traditional breakfast with a about 10 courses. Both were served by a woman dressed in traditional kimono. We walked to another temple through the park and along small streets lined with a mixture of traditional and new housing - most pretty harmonious. This temple, Kiyomizy-dera is on the hill overlooking Kyoto so there are spectacular views.
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