A Temple-heavy Day

(an email to my sister, who is coming to japan in a few weeks)

by the way, it's really important that you know where you are going & that you utilize all the tourist offices in the cities you go to. robby and i are really really tired of getting lost. so few people speak english here. it usually works out because we just tell them our destination, but we've walked in circles quite a few times looking for something. it's especially worse when we've left the guide book in the room. this morning, i looked at several online maps of nara to figure out where our hotel is. the first thing we'll do is go to the tourist office there & ask about bus passes, etc.

we've done SO much walking that we're sore & tired all the time. prepared to do lots of walking! even the walks in the frommer's book are really long. we did the first walking tour yesterday. skipped sanjusangendo hall because we're really close to kiyomizu temple. we are tired of temples. we've seen at least 6. they are all starting to look the same & we have to pay to get in. for kyoto, you must visit kiyomizu & kinkakuji temple (golden temple). don't pay to get into kodai-ji or ryozen kannon. seeing them from the outside is enough. but pay the 300 yen to get into the main hall of kiyomizu temple. the jishu shrine inside is a fun one to visit. i really want to visit fushimi-inari shrine, the one with hundreds of red torii (gates).

we're getting better at choosing restaurants. if the food is take-away (packaged & ready to go), we won't buy it unless we're going back to the ryokan. we stress way too much about where to each the take-away food (i'm not kidding, there is NO public place to sit anywhere in japan! even when you're at a tourist site, there are few benches to rest your feet.). we really like the quick & easy restaurants where you pay & choose through a vending machine & hand your ticket to the waitress to get your food. the portions are big & the dishes are cheap (600-700 yen). even the box set lunches in dept. stores are too expensive for us. they range from $9-11. we also try to look for small mom&pop curry places. cheapest foods: curry, udon, soba.

okay, gotta wake up robby now. we're forgoing frommer's walking tour #2 & taking the bus to kinkakuji. the day pass here is 500yen. not bad considering one trip on the bus costs 220yen. these day passes will probably be sold in your hotel. there is a district bus too, so if you go too far out of the city center, like to katsura imperial villa, you'll have a pay a little more. the bus map is VERY helpful.

geez, i've practically written a blog posting here.

p.s. the kyoto craft center does not exist! we walked all over the gion district looking for it. finally, we went to a police station. we found that we had walked past the building. we get there & find out that it has closed & been replaced by other businesses. so frommer's needs to do some editing. grrrr...
as robby said, "there is no cake!"

by the way, as we've been told by a few friends, police stations are great places to get directions. 80% of their job is giving directions. plus, they will pull out a big map with business names on them, so they can tell you exactly how to get where you're going.

p.p.s. do the part of frommer's walking tour #1 that leads you uphill through otani mausoleum. the slopes filled with 15,000 tombs are amazing. each tomb has an erect concrete pillar, so when you look over them, the cemetery looks like the skyscarpers of manhattan.

also, the nishiki-kori dori is a fabulous place to see where the residents of kyoto shop. it's like the harajuku of kyoto but less extreme. it's a lot of fun to people watch but be prepared - there won't be any places to sit or rest unless you go to a cafe or restaurant.