As explained in the last blog post, the japan rail pass allowed me to travel an unlimited number of times for one week within japan. And that is what brought me from Tokyo to Kyoto. But of course not with a little bit of - let’s call it - confusion.
My first Shinkansen ride
I left Tokyo after my shift on the motor show. I didn’t go to the central train station in Tokyo since the Shinagawa station was closer to the Tokyo Big Sight exhibition center where our hotel was located. Even though I had the Japan Rail Pass, I had to reserve a seat in the train. Luckily this can be done in all major Shinkansen stations and there is always a counter with English speaking personnel. The ticket I got was this one:
It states the origin and destination city, as well as the date and train number and seat in English, but the rest was kind of confusing. The problem was that there wrier two trains on the sam track, that were scheduled to leave for Kyoto at the same time. Since I didn’t realize that until I was sitting in the train, I boarded the first train that came and was happy.
A couple minutes later, the conductor entered the train compartment and while entering he bowed and said some things in Japanese I didn’t understand. I figured that since I was in Japan it was something along the lines of: “I am sorry to disturb you during the pleasant train ride but unfortunately I have to see your tickets…”. At that point I checked my ticket again and realized that the name and number on the train was different from the one printed on my ticket. When the time came that I had to show my ticket, I tried to explain the situation to the conductor and tell him, that I will be exiting the train at the next station and board the one I was supposed to take. Instead of overcharging my for the much faster train, he apologized to me for the bad signage at the train station and even came to me at the next station and told me in simple English that this is where I have to change trains.
After I left the first train my actual train the HIKARI 471 was only a couple of minutes behind. This train was not so luxurious but still fast and totally okay. Along the way to Kyoto I took the picture of the Mount Fuji.
The person who sat next to me even offered to switch seats so I could see better - Japanese people are just super nice.
Reaching Kyoto
After reaching Kyoto 2 hours later, the first thing I noticed was the climate difference between seaside Tokyo and inland Kyoto - it was much colder. I was lucky that I brought my winter coat and scarf along with me. The train station area is rather large but eventually I found the bus that was to take me to the guest house I had booked. On their website, the hostel has a detailed and picturized description map of the route from the bus stop the the house itself. A printed curtain was hung from the entrance of the back alley, jus tot make it easier for hostel-goers to find their way.
Behind the curtain, the “receptionist” greeted me but also told me at the same time that check-in was only after 3pm. I dropped my bags with the receptionist I started to explore the vicinity.
Wandering off from the guest house into the neighboring streets, the first thing I discovered a small court yard with a couple of houses and a section with many stone figures. They were all wearing red pieces of fabric around their necks. It was and still is a place where people from this area think and pray for their deceased.
I was going a little further and I already wore my winter coat but did not bring a scarf yet, but when the sun was setting down the shaded areas began to be cold. This also gave me the opportunity to photograph the changing Japanese maple leafs against the sunlight. Kyoto located inland was much cooler than Tokyo, which is a harbour city. In the following days however, I was better prepared when going out.
IKKUU Guest House
After about 2 hours of walking around I returned to the guest house. I could finally check-in and bring my luggage into the second floor shared sleeping room. Proper hotel rooms were super expensive, though for two nights I spent in Kyoto, I didn’t mind sharing a room. Unfortunately, I didn’t photograph the inside of the house but it was very small. The only footage of the inside I have is this video showing the water conservation efforts in the toilet. Of course, as in all Japanese houses, the obligatory bathroom slippers were present.
Since I was there quite early, there was no one else in the bedroom, but when my bed in an effort of claim what was going to be mine for the next two nights, I realized that there was no heating in the room and insulation was rather transparent. Thin wall and paper-like windows were the main features. With the temperatures I had just experienced outdoors, the very thick real-feather quilts made sense all the sudden. In the end I never froze while sleeping, once after coming out of the shower I felt a little cold. The shower was located next to the kitchen area and was very small. It had a window and since non of the rooms had any heating the window was open in order to reduce the humidity. The only room that was actually heated by a small electric heater was the dinning/living room. And after seeing the heater and the amount of wood that was used in this small(2x3m) room, I see the problem with fires in Japan.
The room and my bed as acceptable for the next two nights and since it was approaching dinner time, I made my way out to find some food. I took my scarf, wore my thickest sweater and I did the thing I always do when being somewhere foreign; I started walking. This time I went into the opposite direction then on my first exploration. I really had no destination where to go; the little research I did said that I should check out a certain section of the city, where many Geishas attend to their clients. This is also where some geisha schools are located. Needless to say, I didn’t really see more than one or two Geishas. I guess in those dining places like the one on the picture below they were working at this time of the day.
On my way through the evening Kyoto to discover something to eat, I came by a shop that was selling Baumkuchen. Not that I discovered it by seeing the actual cake but rather by reading it on the boxes, since it was not written in Japanese script but in German. I didn’t buy a piece of it right away, but rather waited until my departures from Kyoto. Surprisingly enough, the cake survived all the traveling throughout Japan and also the trip back to Singapore.
Away from the streets with the Baumkuchen store and back to finding something to eat. While walking down the street I found this covered Shopping area. I didn’t know the entire size of the area but its very large. Wondering around the seemingly endless streets, I eat something and walked back to the guest house.
The Golden Temple
I slept as long as I could but considering the unavailability of heating in the bedroom, I was up early. The breakfast was easy since there is a convenience store on almost every corner and I knew the drill from Tokyo. Since Kyoto used to be the capitol in the imperial age of Japan, there is a imperial palace in the city. Unfortunately, I was not able to make it. It is required to apply for a tour in advance. This wasn’t on my radar when “planing” the trip. The second most visited attraction in Kyoto is the golden Temple. This is, as the name suggest, a temple covered completely with leaf gold. It was very impressive to see and since the early winter sun was very generous on that particular day the colors were beautiful. It is located in a small park with other Zen temple housings. I actually did the 20-30 minute walkway twice since I was that impressed by the neatness and autumn colors (not present in Singapore) with the clear blue sky and the gold of the temple.
The day was still young and tripadvisor still had a couple of attractions ready for me. The next one on the list was a temple complex called Eikando. It is located a little bit away from the usual tourist paths, but nevertheless there were a lot of people present. The temple is know to be most beautiful during the autumn season and I can only agree. On most of the outside temple area it was not permitted to wear shoes. I cannot imagine visiting this temple in deep winter or blazing hot summer. The autumn sun did its best to heat up the wooden floors and luckily socks were allowed. Most of the temple’s walls were made of paper and it is hard to believe that the buddhist monks could concentrate on praying while freezing or not burning everything to the ground when heating. The outside area was very neat and the Zen gardens were large and gave a chance to calm down while sitting in the sun.
For the last part of my visit in Kyoto I decided to see the thousands of Torii-Gates in the Fushimi Inari Shrine. I was not fully aware of the fact that there were literarily thousands of gates and they were guiding visitors and people for prayers up a hill. I didn’t count them but on my way 3/4 up the hill I passed a lot of gates.
Along the way through the gates there were again stone figures wearing red scarfs. This time it was clear that they were foxes. Foxes were just everywhere and the color orange as well. Most of the gates were wooden and painted orange with black coloured carved characters but some of the gates were made of stone. Those where not painted but still had the characters in-scripteded.
From the point where I stopped going much further up, I had a nice vantage point over the city and its train track which goes through like a snake.
On my way down from the temple I took a different route and saw some more fox figures in different sizes.
This concluded my day in Kyoto and after a dinner I headed back to guest house to prepare for my departure to Hiroshima on the next day.
Parts of the complete Flickr-Album can be seen here.