Kyoto: where culture & history slap you in the face

Ah Kyoto! So beautiful, so busy, so much to see. Kyoto was the former capital of Japan and has an amazing 1,600 Buddhist temples and 400 Shinto shrine as well as palaces, gardens and castles.

I have been in Japan for 3 months now and I thought it was about time we made our first visit to Kyoto. I managed to convince Chris to release his hold on the doona cover and dragged him to Tokyo station. After emptying our wallets at the ticket office, we were on the bullet train and arrived at Kyoto station by 11am. It takes 2 hours 45 minutes on the shinkansen and costs 13,220 yen each way.

With a brief pause to admire the impressive architecture of Kyoto station, we caught the many escalators to the top of the cube and dug into a delicious brunch of fried pork cutlets, tonkatsu. I had mine in a lunch set with rice, miso soup and coleslaw. Chris opted for the Katsu Nabe, hot pot set.

Tonkatsu Wako, Level 11, Kyoto station, "Eat Paradise Food Court" if you are in the area....

For better pictures and the full menu - Tonkatsu Wako

Next we joined the crowds of people at the bus station just outside the train station. The buses stops are clearly marked with their destinations and its pretty easy to navigate your way to the sights you want to visit. It is a little more difficult to push your way off at the stop you want as people enter the bus from the rear door while you are still trying to force your way to the front of the bus to pay the driver as you exit. Chris had to use his elbows in a way I have not seen since our last trip to Footscray markets. I did my usual trick and waited for him to clear a path and followed in his wake.

Our first stop was to Sanjusangen-do temple. This was one of the weirdest temples I have visited. First, we walked around the outside gardens which are lush and serene. You follow the path around the large bell that gets rung twice a day and a fountain that is believed to cure children from crying at midnight. Then you wander inside to the main hall and are greeted by the eerie sight of 1,001 statues of Kannon, the Buddhist goddess of mercy. (No photos are allowed). The hall is dark, noisy and full of incense smoke. The clatter of coins into offertory boxes and the laughter of the student groups takes away any sense that this is a place for prayer or quiet reflection. Watching the students posing like the 28  different guardian statues was pretty funny though. And watching their teacher try and co-ordinate a group photo using a megaphone.

Next we walked (via a couple of other small temples and a hillside cemetery) up to Kiyomizu-dera, another famous Buddhist temple complex up in the Higashiyama mountains.

It is quite a big complex with a few crowd pleasing attractions such as the Otowa-no-taki where you drink from the fountain for health and longevity or attempt to navigate your way between the love stones with your eyes closed, if you make it between the stones you will achieve success in love.

The queue to drink from the waterfall fountain.

 The queue leading up to the love stones.

The main hall verandah.

The pagoda poking through the trees.

And you can't have a day out with kimonos and random mascots.

Not wanting to cop any more pointy granny elbows on the bus, we caught the train back to our hotel instead. We stayed at the Dormy Inn Premium which was around $180 a night, pretty reasonable price for Kyoto and very close to the main train station. Huge buffet breakfast, free noodle soup between 9pm & 11pm and an onsen on the top floor made it a winner for us. Dormy Inn Premium Kyoto

On the Sunday we went to Fushimi-Inari, the Shinto shrine complex famous for its thousands of red torii gates and shrines lining the mountainside. This area had a more chilled out vibe, the crowds thinned out as you reached the peak and there was plenty of back trails you could take to find your own space amongst the foliage.

The shrine complex is dedicated to the gods of rice and sake. The fox is believed to be a messenger of the god Inari, god of rice and harvest. You can see the key to the rice granary in the fox's mouth.

The shrine area was beautiful and green with lots of shade which was a relief from the humidity.  Loved all the oldies hiking up and down and stopping for lunch all in a row.

The red torii were stunning.

Bamboo forest

And cute turtles

Lots of animal themed fountains

Nearly at the top

I didn't envy this old guy lugging drinks uphill

It is believed that anyone who folds one thousand paper cranes will be granted a wish by a crane.

After stopping for an ice cream and checking out some of the tourist stalls we caught the local train back to Kyoto station. We recovered our bags from the train station locker, bought a bento box and got on the afternoon shinkansen back to Tokyo.

So long Kyoto, hope to see you again soon!