Day 5: Kyoto

Today we sucessfully got up and out of the hotel early! Yeah for us! Even with all that sake, Paul managed to get up without any struggle. Maybe that is the trick ;)

We headed down for breakfast in the station and then onto the train to Fushiri Inari temple. This was in Memoirs of a Geisha (i think). It was a huge complex with trails leading up the mountain all covered in these red/orange 'tori gates'. It was cool and chill.. we just wish we had all day to wander around the mountainside. It would have been a wonderful area to spend a full day trekking and having a picknick! But time was of the essence today since it's our last day here. So we saw enough to wet our appetites and then headed on. It finally happened.. Folo lost his train ticket! When we were in SF last summer he lost his bus pass two times in a matter of a week! So, I was getting surprised since it had already been several days and he'd not lost anything!! haha. But he lucked out and the guard trusted us and let him go through without buying another one.

Then we headed to the Manga Museum. It wasn't quite what we were expecting. For some reason we thought it would have exhibitions showcasing old Manga. But instead it was like a huge library that had over 200,000 manga editions. Interesting, but not quite what we had hoped. Nevertheless, Paul bought a cool tshirt and some post cards that we might frame.

We headed back to the main station for a bit to dump our bags and to also get some time to tour around the station area. Did I already say how huge it is? It has a 10 floor department store, several malls, movie theater, long distance trains, local trains, our hotel and tons of eateries! Also a garden on the roof! It was cool to doodle around here for a bit.. we are just starting to get our barings here and not get lost in the station itself!

To keep on our busy schedule we then headed to another temple that we just realized we should see! It's the Heian Temple. This one was pretty cool also. Apparently the garden was in Lost in Translation.. will have to watch the movie again to check it out. We pottered along behind a tour group so didn't have to pay (if there was every a place to pay -- we aren't quite sure! The guidebook says its 600 for the gardens, but we never saw anyone taking money!). The garden was great and we managed to get a ton of photos. Also saw a lady fall in the pond which was pretty funny. so mean.. we laugh at other's misfortune!

Enjoying this run of activity we headed out to find this shoe shop I'd been dying to see. It's called Sou-Sou and specializes in 'toe' shoes. Basically the shoe separates your big toe from your other toes. They look a bit silly, but are sort of cool at the same time. I really wanted a pair, but couldn't manage to find any that fit just right. They have a shop in Tokyo, so I got the address and will try again there. I'm hoping that my feet were just too swollen and sore to fit anything properly! But Paul did manage to get a pair.. not the toe kind, but just regular ones that look similar to converse, but are black and black stripes. Pretty adventurous for him!

Sad and disappointed about the shoes, we headed to a sock shop so I could at least buy some more cute socks. Bought some with pads in the soles.. but once I got out of the shop and put them on I found they didn't fit. POOHIE! Next stop..Clarks, so I could try a pair of shoes on again. I ended up buying them, but within 10 minutes of walking out of the shop i already had blisters :( Definitely not a shopping day for me. But luckily we happened upon a Gap and I found a pair of leggings on sale for 10 USD and that fit! Also got two pairs of my no show socks that i know will fit. Things were starting to look up! But we were getting hungry and tired so headed back home instead of continuing on our shopping journey. I think there will be plenty of shopping in Tokyo, so we better save some room!!

Didn't make it to the Geisha show today, but added other stuff which ended up being more to our liking i'm sure. Sleepy and hungry we'll probably just get something in the 'station' and then relax tonight before we head out tomorrow. Our bodies need a bit of relaxation I think.. and this is a vacation afterall!

Observations for the day:

• Toilets - Ok I know I have already said how cool the toilets are here. But today I had two great ones! One was at the Manga Museum. It was similar to ours in our hotel, but this one had an added button.. 'flushing' sound. Apparently Japanese girls don't like others to hear them pee, so they have a button they can push that mimics flushing sounds to cover up any noise they make! So cool! The second toilet was on the way to the Heian shrine and was a public restroom off the street. It was squat, but as soon as you squatted, the flushing sound started automatically!! I was so excited. They really go to so much effort to make things easy here!
  
• Alot of the Japanese we see roaming around are actually from the West! We asked several 'locals' for help today to find that they were not from here either!

Day 4: Kyoto

Another day in Kyoto and we are loving it more and more. As is usual with us, we look around and think "Hmm.. Could we live here?" The answer so far is a definite yes! Folo feels like we've done lots already, but looking in the guidebook and passing the thousands (there are 2000 temples in Kyoto!) of temples, I feel like we've done very little! But I guess you need a reason to come back right?! (I do want to come back.. once in the winter to see it with snow and sometime in my lifetime for the cherry blossom festivals).

Today we got lost for the first time... in our 'building'! Our hotel is connected to the main train/bus station in Kyoto. This station is massive. It has several shopping malls, millions of trains, buses, etc. We were looking for a grocery store to buy cheese for a packed lunch and ended up totally lost... and in front of McDonalds! I normally stay away from McD's but when it's breakfast I'm easily lured in as I love their egg mcmuffin and hashbrowns! So we relented and had a western breakfast.... and it was yummy!

With full bellies we wandered around for a while, finally finding a grocery store and our way out! One note about the grocery store.. when we walked up to the counter, there were about 10 ladies at different registers. As soon as we started approaching they all started bowing and saying welcome or something nice in Japanese! It was a bit overwhelming to be honest. Then as we left they all started yelling other polite goodbyes or thank yous.. I think I was blushing when we left!!

Our plan was to head to a big temple complex called Nanzen-ji. Several things I have read have said it was their favorite temple, so I had high expectations. Getting there was fine, but then once inside the compound we had no idea what was going on - where the temple was, etc. All of the many maps were in Japanese only, there were no hoards of tourists to follow and it was hot!

Finally we managed to find our way to a garden.. which was pretty boring to be honest. So much for that 5 bucks! But then we decided to go through this little lane up into the woods. It was a hike, but nice and quiet and good for our little pik-nik snack!

Heading down, we were set to find this restaurant that we'd read about..It specialized in Kyoto's special dish - yodofu pot. We knew it would be expensive and traditional, but were willing to try it out for some local flavor. We found it easily and headed in. As is typical with the traditional places, you must take your shoes off before coming in and you sit on the floor on tatami mats. Folo isn't so flexible, so was a bit worried about the floor sitting, but he managed to do fine (with a few beers!)

The meal was a set meal of 6 courses. The first course was a potato soup.. which i would normally love. But this was cold and very slimy... kind of felt like spit!! Paul drank his down of course and i sipped at it slowly! Second course was cold sesame tofu with wasabi on top. It was good.. just difficult to eat with chopsticks! Next came tofu on bamboo sticks with a cold, sweetish soya paste. I loved these, but Paul didn't really like his as much. 4th course was a plate of tempura - yummy! Number 5 headed out.. this was the tofu in a boiling pot (that is boiling on your table). You put a slab of the tofu in your dish, cover with some onions and pepper (lots of chili for us in our indian-ness) and a little sauce. Pretty good.. but we had 5 each and I could barely get down 2.. Folo got down 3! And last was rice with two peices of pickled radish. It was chewy and crunchy... sort of tasted like a pickle but a different texture. For 60 USD i'm not sure it was so filling, but it was the experience and that was definitely worth it!

Not stuffed, but full enough, we headed back to the path of philosophy to see one of the most famous temples here - Ginkaku-ji (Silver Pavillion). Unfortunately the temple itself was under construction, but the gardens were well worth the entrance fee. This was the first garden that I really felt was "Japanese" in what I had in my mind. Even with aching feet and hot and sweaty I really enjoyed this the most.
Again, we headed home for an afternoon rest... somehow our feet are not up to the task of walking 10 hrs a day! I have no excuse since I do so little in India, but Folo works in a dark room all day, so he has a reason for not being able to handle the walking!

Night falls in Kyoto and we head to Gion.. the Geisha district. We pottered around, looking in all the shops and taking photos before heading to a tiny alley called Pontocho which has lots of bars and restaurants. My only hope here was to see a real Geisha on her way to/from work! And that we did see!! She was actually with a man going somewhere!
We found a small little place to eat dinner that had the chef in the middle of the place so we could see all of the cooking. We spent a fortune again.. but whatever we had to sample things! Grilled salmon, fried pumpkin, fried cheese, grilled eggplant, asparagus wrapped in bacon. And Folo finally got to sample some sake! He was scared he'd not be able to walk out after 3 beers and a small sake (which is about 4 small cups). He managed.. and luckily for him he could no longer feel his aching feet!!
And not that anyone really cares, but we have been keeping track of all of our spending so we can figure out what our average daily costs are. Doing anything and everything we want, we are spending on average 140 Euro's per day including shopping and accommodation. Not so bad.. our theoretical budget was double that. And as Paul always likes to say.. its less than 75 Euro each per day (even though it's all coming from only one bank account!) It's good to know that we can continue on as is and not go over budget!! Some days are cheaper, some are more expensive. Today was an expensive day I think!

All in all.. we had a great Kyoto day today. We have tons still on our list of to-dos.. so we'll see if we can get up bright and early and get it all done! Friday we head out to Nara for a night to see the largest wooden temple in Japan. Tomorrow should be an active day.. plans include the Manga Museum (Japanese comics), two temples, booking train tickets, possible geisha dance show, and some shopping!!

Day 3: Kyoto

Today we got up late again! I'm not sure what is wrong with us - we go to bed early (around 9 or 10 pm!) and then can't seem to wake up until after 8 a.m.!! I woke up still not feeling so hot, but managed to push through it. For the sake of time, folo went ahead to the bus depot to get some donuts, coffee and our bus pass while I packed up and got us ready to head to our 2nd hotel in Kyoto! The Granvia is above Kyoto's main train station and a good base to cover some other areas of Kyoto. It's a bit more expensive - well double the price of the first hotel, but it's nice to be in a bit of luxury for a few days. The ryokan was great and all, but we had to be very quiet as the walls are paper thin, we had to share a bathroom/shower with the other guests and our room was no smoking! So it wasn't quite as holiday-ish as we've come to like on our vacations!

After packing up we headed down to the other side of town (about 45 minutes) on the bus and off-loaded our bags until the 3 pm check in. And off we went....

Today we decided we were going to do a walk that was suggested in the guidebook - the southern higashiyama walk. It started off fantastic as right away we saw a geisha walking down the street in front of us!! We were so excited chasing her that we barely even noticed 'tea pot' lane that we were trudging up! At the top of the hill there was another geisha with whom i tried to get my photo made with. Apparently she was 'rented' out by a group or something?!? so no photo :( (i tried mom!)

The first temple on our stop was beautiful and much more to my liking! We followed the hoards of people around taking photos and then to a small entrance area where we paid 100 yen (about 1 dollar) to go inside. I didn't really know what was coming except that it said no photos and no shoes - both of which are common at these temples. I read the description which said the room we were going into was to resemble a womb and would be dark. Once we came out the other end we would feel as if we were reborn. Ok.. shoes off, money given and here we go!

Oh my god... I think that had to be one of the scariest things I've ever done! It was amazing, but also totally frightening! We started off along this path, holding onto the large prayer beads on the wall, and then all of a sudden it was PITCH BLACK. I mean seriously black. I couldn't tell if my eyes were even open. I kept blinking them to make sure they were open. But there wasn't even a speck of light and we were following along in a huge line of people (who i kept bumping into!). I was enjoying it and then all of the sudden i would get this feeling like the ceiling was really low and i was going to bump my head or that I was decending into this long cave like area and wasn't going to be able to get out. Then i'd start freaking out in my mind about what i'd do if i really started to go crazy with not being able to see... finally i realized that i could always turn on the screen to my camera and that would give me a little light. At one point we were stuck in one place for quite a while - waiting for the people in front of us to move. This is the time when i was sort of mentally freaking out the most. Folo was pressed against me, i was really close to the girls in front of me and we weren't moving!!!

Finally we made it to the end which was a big stone with a buddha on it with a tiny bit of light. You were to put your hand on it and make a wish and then go back up towards the light. Whew... i sort of did feel like i had been reborn again after that! It took my body awhile to adjust and calm down. I almost wanted to go again!! It was so extreme and so crazy since we really didn't know what to expect!

I had heard an English speaking guide tell some other foreigners something about it and asked if they had any ?? problems. I had missed the part about what type of problems.. but now I can only assume he was asking if they were clausterphobic!!

After doodling around this temple for ages, enjoying the views over kyoto and having the sun beat down on us (oh yeah.. it was hot and sunny again today!), we continued on our 'walk'. We wondered down a few little lanes with old kyoto homes, traditional style coffee/tea houses, etc. Then we came to another Geisha.. this one being photographed by a professional - with his reflectors and all. I got right behind him and managed to get a few pretty good shots! yeah!!
By this point we were getting hot and tired and there were no food options in sight. So we quickly ran through the rest of our 'walk' and headed back to the hotel/station for some food. We grabbed some food in this massive underground mall beneath our hotel and then checked into our room. It was defiintely worth the switch. We have a great view over Kyoto, large comfy room, tv, cold AC and our very own bathroom!! Folo napped for a while, moaning about his hurting feet (something I do on a daily basis!) while I enjoyed the free internet and caught up on this blog!

Dinner time!! We had planned to go to this tofu restaurant that was mentioned in the guidebook. It took us about 30 minutes to figure out the route and head off. We got there.. with no problems.. only to find that it has been closed for ages! (darn you lonely planet -- you always let me down like this!) But we had a wonderful exchange with this really nice japanese lady who was having a pottery exhibition. She told us where to find this street (Shinmashi Dori) that we'd been looking for for 2 days. So again, we figure out our route and head out. Again, we made it -- with the awesome help of locals who would chase us down the road to give us better directions after they had already pointed us in the right direction.

I'm not so sure i am glad to say that we made it to our second choice destination! It was recommended in the NYTimes article recently written about Kyoto. It was a 3 table restuarant - no English whatsoever and no other customers! But whatever.. we had made it this far, so we decided to just use our guidebook and have the chef cum waiter make us what he'd like. I asked for a tofu dish - fried if possible and some sashimi for paul.

The first dish to come out looked like pudding or something! He told us to put some salt on it and then dip it in the soy sauce. I'm not really too keen on having soy sauce as it usually makes me sick (MSG), but had to do it anyway since the tofu /pudding was tasteless! Then paul's place of fish came out and we figured out what it all was by the phrasebook. He loved all of his, but I was left still starving and not at all satisfied with my "tofu" restaurant!

Oh well.. it was an experience and the guy was super nice and welcoming (as all Japanese seem to be). Now we headed off in search of this Sake bar that I also read about in the NY Times article. We pottered around for ages asking everyone in sight, but somehow couldn't find it. Now we have looked online and will try again tomorrow. So still no food for me.. so we decide to head to our now favorite area Sanjo Arcade. We decided to try a new sushi place - the one actually recommended in the guidebook (we tried to find it the first day, only to eat at another one and then see it after we left the first one!). We sat down and i realized that there was nothing there i'd eat... i just can't stomach raw fish! So as embarrasing as it was, we got up after they served the tea and headed to our first sushi place. Yum yum. more veg sushi and fried shrimp! And a second dinner for paul.

Stuffed, fat and with aching bones, we headed back to our wonderful hotel. Paul is content watching tv and i'm enjoying all of the space!

Tomorrow is another full walking day... not sure how our feet are going to manage all of this walking for 3 weeks! But we are loving it and enjoying almost every minute of being here! Almost feels like home already! We even contemplated just staying here for 10 days and tokyo for 10 days.... but I think we'll probably still head out on Friday and see something new. Til tomorrow. (Oh and I'll go back and post some photos with each of these entries... just too lazy to dig for the photo cord now!)

Observations:

• The people are so insanely nice and helpful!! Oh it's so wonderful to be out of India for a bit!


• Green Tea ice cream is pretty good


• Paul can eat alot of fish -- today he's had 24 peices of fish!


• I'm not loosing any weight even with all this walking and eating pretty small portions :(

Day 2: Kyoto

Well our day didn't start off as early as we'd planned... we got off to a little late start and I was grumpy. I don't think the sushi filled me up enough through the night!

We strolled to the bakery to pick up some ok baked goods and then headed to the bus depot to buy our daily bus pass (5 dollars for the day!). Our first stop of the day was Kinkuji temple... with about a million other tourists. However I must say that there are very few 'white' tourists.. most seem to be asian and probably Japanese. I was less than happy to be shuttled like cows through the Golden temple and less than impressed with the gardens. Uh oh.. not a great start to this day.. kyoto has over 2000 temples and most of our 5 days here were to be for those. I was getting a bit nervous as to what we were going to do with all of our time here if this was how the temples were going to be!!

Stopped off at one of the many vending machines to get a drink and figure out our next move! Not sure why we even try to figure out our plan as we just seem to hop on buses and go where they take us! We couldn't get on the one we had planned, so decided at the last minute to hop on another one! And it was starting to rain.... The rain wasn't supposed to come until a few days later, but seems we were out of luck and not prepared (umbrellas were back at the room).

This bus took us to Nijo ji castle. In the midst of the downpour we buy our tickets from vending machines and try to wait out the rain. it doesn't seem to be going anywhere so we just decide to run through it! Finally managed to get inside the castle to dry off and have a look around. This was much more of an enjoyable experience then the last one.. so the day was looking up! We pottered around inside for a while, then wondered around the gardens enjoying the cooler day.

It's time for lunch again... Always a delima for us it seems. Nothing was really around, our feet were already starting to hurt and hunger was setting in. We tromped along for a good 2km before deciding we should just hop a bus and head back to the Sanjo arcade area! Good choice! We found a great french bakery that did baguette sandwiches. This was just to tide us over until we found somewhere else. Of course it ended up being lunch as we got sucked into this wonderful covered market area - Teramachi! In the midst of thousands of shops are little temples tucked away - some with beautiful buddhas. We spent the rest of the afternoon just bopping around here. Folo bought a holga camera (same maker as his fisheye), i bought some leggings and some cool face wipes. Last shop we went into was a cool Japanese designer shop. I had been scared all day to even try anything on since most of the Japanese girls are so tiny! But in this shop I found a nice dress/long shirt that was so cute. I didn't even think about it, but went over and tried it on --- it fit!! It wasn't so expensive.. nor cheap! Some of the clothes in there were well over 300 USD, so I was happy with my moderate purchase. Overall it was a wonderful experience. It seems we really like doing window shopping and just watching regular people go about their day.

A few observations:

• leggings are so in fashion here! Everyone has them on.. I'm so excited b/c i love to wear them and now can buy plenty more (edit: well... these don't seem to fit quite like they should.. perhaps i'm a bit too fat or too tall?? the leggings i bought only go to my knees when the photo shows them at your calfs!)



• There are clean free toilets everywhere! So wonderful. And they are so cool! the one at our guesthouse has a seat heater, bedei (Spell?) and another water splasher! And has a 'sink' at the back where the water is recycled back into the toilet.



• the people are really helpful even when neither of us speak the same language.
  


• No one stares at us here.



• Its not much more expensive then the west really...
  

After shopping, we decide to head back to our area and get some food. The wind is whipping up and its getting down right chilly out!! But we are loving the cool weather and want to get back to put our hoodies on since we never get to wear them!

Walking around our neighborhood we happen into a tiny little restaurant and are again welcomed loudly and energetically, so we decide we must stay even if there isn't anything on the menu we like!! Luckily there is some food for both of us! Paul got raw tuna with wasabi and avocado and i got veg tempura! Yeah!! Our waiter was so sweet and cute with us trying to speak japanese -- he just kept saying thank you in english anytime we spoke in Japanese!! So after a lovely real japanese meal we head off to the slot machine shops that are all over. It was so intimidating though!! There were workers on every aisle and everyone was staring at us and nothing was in English of course. So we booked it out of there and headed back home!

And.. i'm happy/sad to say.. i made it 30 hrs before having my first MSG reaction! I thought it would come after that soba noodle dish the first day, but it didn't, so I kind of let my guard down and just ate anything and everything! Well... apparently the sauce that comes with tempura or the tempura itself had MSG.. and within 1 hr I was in the toilet back at the hotel vomiting. Oh well.. i knew it would come sooner or later. But it hasn't discouraged me yet. We'll just have to keep experimenting! Off to bed, feeling the nice cold air come through the window!

Day 1 : Kyoto

Well, after not having a shower available, we put back on our dirties and headed out the door to the unknown!

I do have to say that it isn't weird being in a country where I understand nothing and can read even less. Have I done too much travelling already? or lived too long in India? Very few things feel very foreign to me these days --- which kind of takes the fun out of travelling to be honest. I know that I can easily get around and manage with no local vocabulary and there is always somewhere to shop :)

We walked down the road a bit checking places out and trying to find our first lunch spot! We made it to some mall and everything I had read said that often the best and cheapest food is in the basement of malls... No such luck here though. We did manage to walk around the grocery store looking at all the food and sampling it as we went along! No idea what we tried, but most things were surprisingly good! To tide us over for some more adventuring we ate some little cripsy cream filled thing... which i thought was going to be a baked potato! (Note: Most restuarants and eateries have photos of everything... but these photos aren't always so detailed!)

Back out on the streets we were roasting in the heat (but thankfully no humidity!) but managed to find a Soba noodle joint that was on the recommended list from our guesthouse. We walked in to a tiny little place to be greeted with tons of "welcomes" in japanese and felt that we must stay no matter what now! We sat down and were quickly brought water and green tea along with an english menu! Whew... we had been looking at the regular one and had NO clue what we were going to order! We managed to order.. shrimp soba noodles for folo and tofu soba for me! We sucked them down and just enjoyed our first little meal in Japan! So far so good.. no major catastrophes yet!

Not sure what to do, we referred to our handy travellers bible (lonely planet) to see what was in our neighborhood. It looked like a temple wasn't too far away, so we decided to start walking. After about an hour of this (with aching feet) we decided that we weren't going to find it so we better just hop on a bus and head somewhere else! Not sure what the protocol was, we boarded where the rest of the folks did (the back) and then just kind of stood around waiting... In India someone comes to take your fare. I searched and searched, but didn't see anyone. Then I saw some girl go up the front and put some money in a slot. So i thought I should do the same!! Oops... it was a change machine!! haha. Well now we have plenty of change :) Our first bus experience was pretty smooth.

We just hoped on the first bus we saw and it was heading towards Gingkuji temple which was on our list. We knew we'd already missed the closing times, but thought we could just walk around for a bit. We ended up walking all along the "Path of philosophy" enjoying the quiet, the kitty cats and of course the Japanese homes. Starving and with aching feet we decided we better find out way out of the 'wooded' area and find a bus! Didn't ever find a bus, but we did manage to walk to a train station. That took a bit as well.... didn't have the slightest clue how to manage the automated machines! But we managed without loosing any money or patience!

Our next stop... to a sushi joint where you pick your food off of a conveyor belt! Just what the doctor ordered! Stepping out of the subway station we landed ourselves right in the midst of a very happening area -- Sanjo Arcade area. Found a sushi joint (not the one we had intended though!) and sampled our way through about 12 plates of sushi! I ate fried shrimp and lots of little vegetarian ones while paul picked up each and every type of fish that rolled by! Stuffed for about 25 dollars we were happy campers! Not sure if our feet could manage anymore, we opted for getting back to bed early so we'd be fresh for our first full day of Kyoto site seeing!

Travellator Begins here...

First we have arrived in Japan safe and sound!

To recap the last few days...

We got up early Sat morning and headed to Mumbai's airport to board our 5 1/2 hr flight to singapore. I watched movies the entire flight (No country for old men and 1/2 of There will be blood) while folo slept and watched Juno!

We arrived to Singapore's airport knowing we'd have a 5 hr layover. But everyone assured us that this would be no problem in that airport. It surely wasn't! There is tons of nature to see, plenty of smoking rooms (or outdoor courtyards to be more specific), shopping and activities. We doodled around from one nature stop to another (i.e. smoking rooms), browsed the shops, picked up a few reading materials and just basically basked in the orderliness, quietness and cleanliness of it all! We rode the train from terminal to terminal and also the moving footpaths (called a travellator - hence the name of the post!)

Toward the end of our stay in Singapore's Changi airport we were both exhausted and ready to get on our next flight to sleep! Unfortunately it was full and not quite as spacious as our first flight but I guess that doesn't matter when you are sleepy!

I ate my first bit of fish on the flight -- the only options were chicken or shrimp, so i started our Japan trip with fish! I had told myself I was going to be open to eating whatever came across my plate and not be picky about being vegetarian. So far so good...

Arrived in KIX (the airport near to Osaka/Kyoto) and found ourselves in another country where we don't know whats going on!! Haha. Upon arrival the pilot said that the temperature was 29 degrees celcius -- WHAT?!?! We were so excited for our 22 degree days and it was only 8:30 a.m.!!! Feeling a bit flustered at the thought of that and hoping that he must be wrong, we headed out to immigration. Had our photos and fingerprints taken for entry, had our bags thoroughly searched by customs (apparently coming from India means we might have drugs on us!) and then walked out to meet our MK Shuttle man who was there waiting for us.

The shuttle guy directed folo to the ATM - now we have money in hand and are ready for the 1 and 1/2 hr drive to kyoto. So far so good.

I knew from reading other people's blogs not to expect much on that drive -- and it really wasn't much to see. Instead I layed down and slept some more to wake up in Kyoto and near our guesthouse. Arriving to our 'neighborhood' was nice -- it was a cute, residential area that felt not much different than other places we've been. Folo said he felt that it was like America.. whereas I felt it was more like some small European city. All of the buildings were small and low to the ground, lots of greenery and CLEAN! Spotless to be exact!

We were greeted warmly (in Japanese) and led to our room. We had booked a traditional japanese inn (called ryokan) for our first two nights (mostly because nothing else was available - but it was also cheaper than hotels - 100 USD per night).

It was a very cute little place with great wooden floors, tatami mats all on the floors and a view out to the garden (if you didn't know it.. kyoto-ites love their gardens!). We got settled in and ready for a shower only to realize that the hot water is only available from 6-9 a.m. and pm! oops. Guess we'll go our first day dirty!!