Kyoto

Our next stop in Japan was Kyoto.

In Kyoto, we stayed in a Ryokan; a traditional Japanese inn. In a Ryokan, we slept on mats on the floor and normally, we would shower in public baths (but we booked a room with a private bath = P) The service was impeccable and the experience was definitely a requirement when visiting Kyoto.

Our mats all ready for sleeping

The bathrobes they provided

=)

We arrived Wednesday early afternoon in Kyoto and took things easy. We walked around and explored the city a little bit on our own, then took a walking tour with an English speaking guide in Gion; an area of town primarily inhibited by Geishas. In that tour, we learned a lot of different facts about the history of a Geisha and their role in modern day society. Also, in Kyoto, they prefer to be called Geikos. A young Geiko is known as a Mieko....she is basically a Geiko in training and in modern times, as young as 15 years old. Back 100 years ago, young girls as young as 9 years old could be a Mieko.

View when crossing the river. The mountains really like like the paintings.

Night walk in Gion

The next day was our busy day in Kyoto. We went all over different parts of Kyoto to visit different sites. The first stop was Kinkaku-ji; the Golden Pavillion Temple. Although it was snowing, cold and crowded, the Golden Pavillion was definitely a site to see. Built in the late 1300's, Kinkaku was destroyed by fire in 1950. After being reconstructed, a more extravagant temple was designed. Today, the top two levels of the pavillion are covered in gold-leaf and is said to house relics of buddha.

Kinkaku-ji

little waterfall in the gardens

Next, we walked about half an hour down the road to visit another temple. This temple housed a five-story pagoda! But first, we toured the temple where we had to take off our shoes and walk on the raised wooden platforms (just like the palaces in old chinese movies!)

Dragon fountain in front of the temple

Rock garden in front of the temple

Look at the details of the paintings!

The garden

the pagoda

Next stop was the Bamboo garden path. But before we made it out to the path, we got hungry. We were outside the center of Kyoto, so finding food was not neccessarily easy....especially since in Kyoto it was already difficult due to the fact that most menus did not have pictures and were all in Japanese! But luckily, we stumbled across a little hole in the wall with somewhat of an english menu. And boy are we glad we stopped!

It was a small little restuarant owned by a couple and there were two things on the menu and like 3 different things you can add to each. So we both ordered the stirfried noodles with pork. The man would cook everything at his station (which was viewable by the clients) and when everything was cooked down, they would put it on a metal shovel and put it on the warm slab in front of us....it was yummy.

Sizzling hot!

Afterwards, we made our way to the Bamboo gardens. It was impressive to see, but less than I imagined. Perhaps it's played out by expectation since it's on like every guidebook cover.

Still pretty impressive tho

Look how tall they are!

Next stop is to the other side of town to visit Fushimi Inari. It is a very large temple which is dedicated to the fox (considered the god of rice and recently, the god of business) We first walked around the immediate area around the temple; there were many smaller shrines and many statues of foxes. Then we made our way up the mountain through the tunnel of red gates. We found out later via wikipedia that each gate is donated from a business to the temple....in hopes that the gods will smile upon them. So we made our way up and we walked uphill for a good 40 minutes or so.....only to find that we've moved like an inch on the map. It was getting dark and the hike uphill was not an easy one....so we did not go all the way up the mountain. =P

At the gate of the temple

Wishes and prayers at the temple

The lots and lots of gates

The view downhill of the gates, they each have an inscription on them

Uphill, I think we walked this one then stopped =p

 The next day for breakfast, we ordered the traditional Japanese breakfast at the Ryokan. It was worth to pay for the experience; plus, it was a lot of food!

Not even sure about everything we ate, but there's the sweet egg, steamed tofu, miso soup, veggies, pickled vegetables, something that was like fishballs, rice and tea.

We started our last day in Kyoto by visiting the Shogun Palace. Not very impressive on the outside, but quite ornated on the inside.

outside gates

details of the gate

fancy huh?

Look at that view!

Pretty lanterns by a shrine

Next we walked around the Imperial Palace garden. It was lovely since some flowers were starting to bloom. We were too early to see any cherry blossoms, but instead, we were able to see the plum blossoms. They're not as full as cherry blossom trees, but the individual flowers are just as pretty!

A little stream

^_^

Our final site of the day was the Yasaka Shrine in Gion. There we walked around and took in the Kyoto atmosphere until our next activity.

Look at all the Lanterns!

One of our last activities in Kyoto was to see the show of Japanese traditions and Geisha presentation. Within the shower, we saw the traditional Japanese tea ceremony, traditional flower arrangement, a Japanese comedy, traditional Japanese instruments, and of course, a Geisha dance done by current Miekos. We even got to take a picture with them afterwards!

Tea ceremony.....boy it took a long time!

Flower arrangement

Instruments

Japanese court music

Comedy

Miekos dancing

Us ^_^

And our last meal in Kyoto was tempura. Germain was craving it for a while, but we couldn't seem to find one. Luckily, we found an advertisement for "tempura" but everything was in Japanese! So how did we order? Luckily, there was one waitress who spoke english and she helped us with ordering. It was delish!

yumyum!

So that's Kyoto! Very interesting to see the old culture so intertwined with the modern. People were really polite and very helpful. It definitely puts our Western customer service to shame....and they don't even work for tips!

Our trip in Japan is almost over, but before that: Osaka with Gaje!

Toyko!

It's amazing how you can go from one world to what seems like a completely different world within hours. After about 12 hours of flight from Paris, we were taken to the other side of the world into Toyko, Japan. From there, our week of adventure started!

Our first day in Toyko started off with a stroll in Yoyogi-koen, a large park where we saw many people running and doing tai-chi. Unfortunately, the weather was not great (it was rainy or snowy the whole week) so it wasn't as lively as it could be. From there, we walked to the Meiji-jingu; a shrine built in the early 1900's dedicated to the Emperor Meiji and his Empress.

Yoyogi Park

Gates of the Meiji Shrine

People's prayers and wishes

pretty

After our walk, we headed to Harajuku, an area in town known for it's fashion shops and fashion showoffs....including youngsters dressed as anime characters and outrageous outfits. Then it was time for lunch. Not being able to read or speak a language definitely proved to be difficult when it comes to ordering food. Luckily, in Tokyo, most places have pictures or English translation. For lunch, we stumbled into an underground restaurant.

Fried Ham with slices of beef and vegetables

On our way home, we walked by the Shibuya train station where we had a wonderful view of the Shibuya crossing; one of the busiest crossroads in the world. It was very interesting to watch the crowds of people cross all at once; it was even cooler with all the clear umbrellas.

Shibuya crossing

Picture as we crossed the Shibuya Crossing

The next day, we took a day trip tour to visit Mt Fuji. Unfortunately, the weather has been pretty unusual lately and it has been snowing mounds and mounds of snow. It's been snowing so much that we could not go up Mount Fuji, instead, we stopped by several points to try and view Mount Fuji. However, it was all covered up with clouds and fog. We were not able to see any bit of the mountain until the end of our trip. Our tour also included a traditional Japanese bento box lunch.

Wheeee....a picture of me and Mt Fuji!

Braised Seaweed, Dried Radish with Sesame Sauce, Rolled Omlette, Tuna Sashimi, Deep Fried Breaded Prawn, Brasied Vegetables, Seasonal Vegetable Salad, Fried Chicken, Seasonal Fruits with Rice and Miso Soup

Whoohoo....the peak of Mount Fuji right above our heads

Close-up shot

Japanese dumplings with hot green tea

After our trip to Mount Fuji, we took a direct train to see the Toyko tower as the sun started to set. In front of the tower was a temple. We didn't go up the tower since we planned to go up a different tower the next day. But it was still something we had to visit and see.

A peaceful temple in the middle of the busy city

Not sure who these are in memory of, but the color was beautiful

Toyko Tower

And for dinner, we found a cute little sushi place in Shibuya. The great thing about it was that we ordered everything (even water) on an ipad! Didn't need to speak to anyone! lol. So, we would scroll through the English menu on the ipad, select what we wanted and the kitchen would make it fresh (ish) and then send it through a track right to our seats! Cool huh? The sushi tasted fresh too!

Yumyum sushi!

=)

During our last day in Tokyo, the weather was much nicer. First we made our way over to the Tokyo Sky Tree. Built as a radio tower, it has two observation decks for the public to visit. It is the tallest tower in the world standing at 2080 feet high.

wow it's high

Eep! Don't look down!

 Afterwards, we made our way to the Imperial Palace, the residence of the Emperor of Japan. The building are off limits to the public (as it is the current home of the Emperor) but we were able to walk in the gardens.

Bridge into the gardens

Spring is coming!

Cool building

Back outside

Lastly, one of our last stops in Tokyo was Artnia; the official Square Enix store in Tokyo (a video game store) I was quite excited about this stop, but in the end, a bit disappointed. They closed their bigger store back in 2012 and opened this store. It is much smaller than I imagined and they carried a lot less merchandise. Nonetheless, it was a place I had to visit.

Artnia

Materia and Crystals

Well....that's our trip to Toyko in a nutshell. Of course, there were a lot more eating and a lot more site seeing, but I didn't always remember to take pictures. It was really a great experience and definitely a place we would visit again. Everyone was super nice, the city was really clean, the food was quite afforableand there are still lots to see. Maybe one day, but for now....

Next stop: Kyoto!