kyoto – Rainwater Rambling

Japan 2018 Day 15: Kyoto to Takayama

May 17, 2018 richardt

Japan2018

Today we traveled from Kyoto to Takayama.

This was a Limited Express train with wide scenic windows.

These girls had a tripod setup and were taking pictures of themselves.

Gillian with a wood sculpture.

Some giant carp flags.

We toured around the streets of Takayama.

Gillian wanted to go to Hida-Furukawa station which was a 20 minute train ride. It is the station that appears in the movie Kimi no na wa (Your Name).

The train was pretty empty.

There were spots around the train station that appear in the movie, like this view of the train station.

A group shot while waiting for the train back to Takayama.

This was a liquor store across from the Takayama train station.

Japan 2018 Day 14: Kyoto

May 16, 2018 richardt

Japan2018

bird geisha japan kyoto temple umeboshi

We were up early this morning to head to the Fushimi Inari Taisha shrine, known for its winding path of torii gates. The guidebooks said you need to go early to get pictures without anyone else in them.

There is a hike up through the gates.

This guy was painting one of the tori gates.

Time for a snack. A tsukemono cucumber on a stick.

Our next stop was the Nishiki market. Some expensive rice.

Some octopus on a stick.

There was a Peanuts store.

A giant container of umeboshi.

There was a tsukemono sampling station. It was delicious.

Gillian with a bottle of umeboshi.

Gillian enjoying a tskeumono cucumber on a stick.

The market was in an indoor mall.

Lunch was at a conveyor belt sushi restaurant.

After lunch we visited the Toji Temple and its gardens.

Another heron fishing for lunch.

And then it flew off.

Some fire buckets.

The Japanese Colonel.

In the evening we headed to the Gion area.

We spotted another geisha.

There was some sumo wrestling on the television at the hotel.

Japan 2018 Day 13: Kyoto

May 15, 2018 richardt

Japan2018

bird geisha japan kyoto monkey temple

Today we went Arashiyama’s monkey park, where they have macaque monkeys roaming around. We got there early, so had to wait for it to open. There was a heron on the river bank.

The monkeys are able roam around the park.

There were some babies sticking close to their mothers.

This was the oldest monkey in the park.

You can go inside the building and feed the monkeys.

The next stop was Arashiyama’s Bamboo Grove.

Next it was on to the Golden Pavilion (Kinkaku-ji).

The buses were crowded.

We headed to Nijo Castle. Here is an umbrella stand, that lets you lock up your umbrella. Gillian needed one of these in Hiroshima, where someone took her hotel loaner umbrella from a stand outside of a 7-11.

We ended the day geisha spotting in a small neighbourhood in Kyoto.

These were magnets on the back of the hotel door. Depending on which service you wanted you would put the magnet on the door.

Japan 2018 Day 12: Hiroshima to Kyoto

May 14, 2018 richardt

Japan2018

hiroshima japan kyoto temple totoro

Today we were heading to Kyoto, but since the weather was so good, we returned to Hiroshima’s Peace Memorial Park today to see the memorial cenotaph and a few other memorials we didn’t get to see during the rain yesterday.