8.11.2016 – 8.11.2016  18 °C

First morning in Kyoto! Brekky was a western affair in our room of muesli, yoghurt and tea! (We’ve decided on needing a break in the amount of rice consumed on a daily basis).

Kyoto is a largish city mainly served by bus. So we, like a thousand other people lined up at the bus station to get on the bus to go to Higashiyama to see “ye olde worlde” Japan. Seriously, thousands! We spent our day (albeit for two occassions) in a slow shuffle through Higashiyama, seeing two thirds of what should have taken us 5hrs!

First stop was to Kiyomizu Dera Temple. A world heritage site high above the streets of Higashiyama. The main attraction is this huge wooden pavilion set high out over the cliff where worshippers can pray, and tourists can gawk. I actually had no idea how “out over the cliff” the pavilion was until we had walked around to the other side of the complex and got a view of the main hall! I’m not sure it was built to take the weight of hundreds of thousands of tourists every day….. Super glad we didn’t feel any tremors whilst walking thru it! (Although maybe I should have more faith.. it is a temple after all!)

We found a rare piece of solitude by leaving the pack and heading out thru the grounds of the temple, down steep cobble stoned roads. It meant we missed one of the other main attractions (holy water falls) but to be honest it was so nice not being in a constant selfie shuffle that I couldn’t give a damn about missing the holy water!!!

From Kiyomizu Dera we re-joined the throng heading back down the mountain and over towards Kodaiji Temple (still in Higashiyama). The streets in this part of Kyoto are as “ye olde worlde” as you can get… Tiny cobblestone streets- bottom floor shops, top floor sleeping quarters (I guess). No joke, this is one big tourist mecca. I think it is probably a rite of passage for all Japanese to come to Kyoto (Kimono or Yukata clad) and of course so does every tourist who comes to Japan so there are people and souvenir shops EVERYWHERE! There is also a plethora of little shops selling Japanese food…. and we stopped at just about all of them trying out the different textures and flavours.

First eatery was not long after leaving Kiyomizu Dera, here we consumed Japanese cream puffs and a cup of coffee.. Delish!! Further down the road we consumed little chip like sweets and this big green roll thing (which had the texture of sponge cake). Our favourite eatery was this chilli shop.. We bought some of this chilli and sesame flakes that you sprinkle over plain rice.. OMG.. can’t wait to consume when i get back to AU.

Still walking towards Kodaiji (make sure you have top notch walking shoes for Kyoto and a pole would have been handy) and we tried out fried Croquettes + some sort of fried rice ball… We also found ourselves a Kimono hair shop. I’ve been dying to find a normal looking Geisha hair prong for my hair (I often wear my hair up in a french knot and clips for knots are hard to come by). Geisha hair prongs are a dime a dozen.. but all of them have way too much bling for my liking.. I wanted a sedate and normal looking (which of course cost me an arm and a leg).. Finally found what I was looking for, and Geisha clip in hair, continued the interminable shuffle towards Kodaiji.

Finally found what we thought was the temple and in fact found the cemetery!!!! Apparently it is a “histric” site of Kyoto. (Surely the poor Jinglish should have given it away that we weren’t in a tourist hot bed).. The lack of tourists and english ticket sellers should have also given it away that we are at the wrong place, but no, we doggedly climbed the hill to discover the resting place of hundreds of souls. We had invested 500Y in the endeavour so felt obliged to wander around before our feet got sick of the trudge and we went looking for the real shrine.

Kodaiji proved to be up a pile of stairs (that of course had heaps of people walking up) and proved to be worth the effort. A beautiful temple with my first rock garden and water contemplation shrine. The shrine was a pretty site because the maples are changing colours, the moss is super green, grey rocks… Quintessentially gorgeous Japanese shrine. (No carp though.. Actually haven’t seen a Koi since being in Japan.. surely i’ll find one soon)

Kodaiji proved to be the last shrine of the day- with super sore feet and a left knee playing up we called it quits and went hunting for some udon for dinner and a welcome glass of wine.. The udon proved easy, the glass of wine- not so easy. We ended up wandering Gion, up and down more shopping arcades hunting for the elusive vino. Finally gave up and googled.. and found a british pub! Oh well, the wine went down well!!!