We flew into Tokyo Narita airport straight from DFW, a 12 hour flight, and arrived about 1:30 pm. We got our Rail Passes and took the Shinkansen (bullet train) to Kyoto, changing trains in Shinagawa. We arrived in Kyoto around 7:00 pm and walked to the ryokan (traditional Japanese Inn) we stayed at in Kyoto. I made that sound easy, but we wandered around a bit trying to find it. Japanese cities tend NOT to be laid out on a grid, plus only major streets have names, and buildings as a rule don't have numbers on them. Finding things is by landmarks and wandering.
Anyway, we got there and the place was more than worth finding. It's name is Shimizu Ryokan, and the first picture on this post is of it. We stayed there four nights and ate breakfast there every morning. Traditional Japanese breakfast is fish, vegetables, rice and miso soup (see above). This picture I took with my phone one morning. The food was delicious. Our room was an 8-tatami room with a small table, futons and a private bathroom. We decided public baths were a little more traditional than we were willing to get. The place was perfect for our purposes. The staff was exceptional and every afternoon when we came in, they brought us tea.
The first day we were there we walked back to Kyoto Station and got a 2 day pass for the subway and bus system so we could move around freely. Then we took the subway up to Nijo-jo which is a palace in central Kyoto. Nijo-jo is pretty awesome (picture above) and has nightingale floors - the kind that "sing" like a nightingale when you walk on them. We wandered the grounds a bit and took lots of pictures. Then we got on a bus and went to Kinkakuji Temple. I should mention that these places are famous and attract a LOT of tourists, so when you see pictures with no extraneous people in them, you know I waited a while to take them. You can see why Kinkakuji is so famous. It's just beautiful (picture below).
The weather wasn't really cooperative while we were in Kyoto, raining on and off, but we just carried umbrellas and kept going. It never was serious enough rain to dampen our enthusiasm or make life difficult.
Next we went back to Kyoto Station and walked over to Sanjusangendou Temple. This temple has several thousand statues of Buddha inside the temple, but no picture taking is allowed inside, so there's only outside pictures, and none of the thousands of Buddhas. Most of the temples don't allow pictures to be taken inside because the flash from photography damages the paint and finishes. Restoration is being done in many places that we visited, and of course everything is continuously maintained.
This picture is of a big bell and log for ringing it outside of the temple at Sanjusangendou. After leaving Sanjusangendou temple we walked back toward Kyoto Station and found a place near the Station to have a late lunch. I had a pork cutlet set. Yum. Unfortunately the tennis shoes I took on this trip were slightly too big and gave me a nice blister on my left foot after this first day of walking. We walked more on this trip than I have in years, so I'm sure it was good for me.
After our late lunch we took the subway to a place I remembered where there was a shopping district. I remembered correctly! It's called Teramichi shopping area, and we found a store that carried some anime and did a little shopping there before calling it a day and returning to the ryokan.
That was our first full day in Kyoto. I found representative photos from that day and posted them here. You can see why I'm going to need to talk about this trip in several post, since these were just first day pictures.
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