Julie and Ross's Weekend in Kyoto - Day 2

So the day began in a great fashion - Ross and I went to Starbucks for breakfast (there was one in the Hotel) and drank Chai Lattes (I'm really into these!) and ate sandwiches and buns. This was the first time that we'd ever gone to Starbucks together, and it was lovely!

We then jumped on a bus (now getting good as sussing out the Kyoto transport- hey, after the Tokyo trains, we're invincible!), and headed to Kinkaku-ji ('The Golden Temple') - this is probably the most famous and well visited temple in Tokyo.

It was absolutely amazing! Apparently, the original building was built in 1397 as a retirement villa for Shogun Ashikaga Yoshimitsu, and his son converted it into a temple. A young barking mad monk then decided it was his mission to raze it to the ground in 1950, and five years later it was rebuilt exactly to the original design, but with even more gold-foil covering.

The first two layers of the temple are covered in goil-foil, and this was redone a few years ago, even thicker!

It's amazing - it SOO shiny!

The lake is supposed to reflect the moon beautifully!

...we took quite a few pictures, but it was so pretty!

Here's not the best pic of Ross and I, but as we had to ask someone to take it for us, and therefore there aren't many of these, I decided to put it in!

...and a close up so you see really how shiny it was!

There were beautiful trees and gardens around it too

...and a lovely little waterfall

There was this strange statue thing where you threw money, so we took a pic!

...and in true Japanese fashion, you're given the path to follow, which everyone dutifuly does, which does means that you don't have to think too hard about which route to take!

So, this was our final glimpse of this beautiful temple

After the golden temple, we had found that there was a temple sale (sort of crossed between and antiques fayre and a festival) in a nearby temple - Kitamo-Tenman-Gu. We were rather templed out, so we didn't really look at the temple very much! The temple sales was huge - a mix of food stalls, games (like you'd get at a school fete!) second hand kimonos (some were beautiful) and antiques. We saw some statues in a similar style to our Lions, but nothing as nice (which pleased me!). It felt baking hot, and the prices were very inflated, so we didn't buy anything. We made a mental note to find out about more temple sales in Tokyo, and get some good souvenirs!

Continuing on our missions to 'do' Kyoto in 2 days, I really wanted to go to the place with the 'tunnel' of orange 'torii' (gates). Didn't really know much about it, but had seen in a few tourist pics (and it's in the film of the 'Memoirs of a Geisha' book!). So we worked out what it was called, and where it was, and hopped on a train to the 'Fushimi-inari-Taisha', a couple of stops out of Kyoto.

We didn't really know what to expect, as I'd just seen the 'classic' photo of the two orange tunnels next to one another...

...Here's the classic pic.

Apparently, this shrine was dedicated to the gods of rice and sake in the 8th Century. As the role of agricutlure diminsed, deities were enroled to ensure prosperity in business. Nowadays, this shrine is apparently one of Japan's most popular, and is the head shrine for some 30,000 Inari shrines throughout Japan. There, a bit of history from the guidebook!

The tunnels were bizarre - made of hundreds and thousands of the classic Japanese 'torii' (gates). They had writing on one side (but we had not one clue what it said!)

... all very cool!

The entire complex consists of five shrines sprawling across the wooded slopes of Inari-yama. There was path which wondered 4km (apparently) up the mountain, lined with hundres and hundreds of these red torii.

Here's a map showing (very basically!) the location of the torii.






There were also dozens of these stone foxes (some wearing these dashing little red pinnies!) The fox is considered the messenger of Inari - the god of cereal grains.

The key in his mouth is for the rice granary. It looked at bit like what one of our lions has in his mouth!

We walked for about 15 mins up the slope, through hundreds of Torii, seeing lots of foxes and little shrines, then read in the guide book that 'it is a pleasant day hike to follow the trail all round' so at this point we gave up - Julie was on a mission to fit in one more temple!

We had a very nice green-tea flavoured Mr. Whippy (actually it was quite nice, but on balance, Ross's chocolate one was nicer!)

So, on to the last temple of the day (much to Ross's chagrin!). I'd seen this iconic pic on the front of a couple of guide books and, as luck would have it, it wasn't far from the station.

So we caught the train back to the station, and then walked the 1km to this final temple - the Toji Temple.

This Pagoda is made entirely out of wood, and it the tallest pagoda in Japan - it has lightening conductors all over it in case of fire!

It was very pretty, and Ross did some good 'arty' shots!

...then there were some other templey bits with lots of interesting things in them. But to be honest, we were a bit bored by this stage, and wanted to catch the 4:30pm shinkansen!

So, temple done, we raced back to the station.

We had thought it felt very hot, and on the way back to the station, Ross spotted this building. You can't see it very clearly, but there's a red digital display showing the temperature - at 4:15pm in the afternoon, it was still 40 degrees! So it really was very hot!

All went to plan, we caught the 4:30pm Shinkansen back to Tokyo - here's a pic of the (according to Ross) 'very sexy' train.

We got safely back to Tokyo around 7pm. Tokyo seemed very very high-rise and neon compared with the more rural feel of Kyoto.

A great weekend all round. Would def recommend a visit to Kyoto to anyone who comes to visit us!