Japan: Hakone, Kyoto and Nara

Hakone

We saw our first Shinkansen/bullet train and got on it for only 15 minutes from Yokohama to Odawara. It is unbelievable how fast, smooth, comfortable and reliable it is. It stops only for a few minutes so you have to be quick to get on and off, and there are reserved and unreserved seats carriages, as well as a pink carriage for female solo travellers. A train later we got to Hakone Yumoto, where we forwarded our luggage to our hotel, yes you can do that here. This clever/lazy move gave us the option to stay in town and wait until 4pm which is when we had our private onsen booked. Public Onsen are normally divided for male and female, and everyone has to enter the bath completely naked, after having washed thoroughly in the showers at the entrance. Tattoos are not allowed also, since in Japan only criminals have tattoes, or at least in the old days so it is still a tradition not to accept people with tattoes in public Onsen…this actually makes me think twice about getting a tattoo!

We decided to ease into our Onsen experience and booked a private room where we could go together, for an hour at 4pm. Before then we managed to play a good game of crazy golf, across 9 holes on a little hill in Hakone Yumoto, which was very good fun. Bruce won, but I think he must have cheated a bit when I was not looking… While I on the other hand was a perfect example of honest playing (or maybe it was the other way around ;))

We then had a sushi lunch which was nice, and some pastries at the station since we were still a bit hungry!

When the time came to go to our Onsen we were quite ready and excited about it. We chose the Yuryo onsen, one of the good rated ones on both Lonely Planet and Trip Advisor. It was a great choice and we enjoyed our soaking in hot (actually very HOT, much hotter than our SPA pools in Europe/UK) water. Our hot tub was circular and was located outside, very pleasant. We also decided to have some freezing showers in between, to enhance a better circulation. After an hour we were ready for a little sleep! We left the onsen and went back by the free shuttle bus to the centre of the city, before heading to our hotel by public bus. The bus went up the hills with a lot of windy roads, and finally got to Palace Hotel Hakone after half an hour.

The hotel had a very “Shining” feel to it, proper old school and felt like being in the 70s. It was also quite empty at dinner time which made it even more spooky. The weather unfortunately wasn’t great, and we chose this hotel since it is our one chance to see Mount Fuji and from the terrace you should get good views when it is clear.

We had dinner and did some chores after dinner since there was nothing around the hotel, and pretty much no one inside. We set our alarm at 5am to try and see the sunrise, when apparently it’s more likely for Mount Fuji to be clear of the clouds.

It was quite painful to wake up, and it was raining and foggy and no views, so we started losing our hopes and went back to bed. We then woke up at 10am, and the sun was shining!

We ran to the terrace to spot Mount Fuji and he was there, but still half under the clouds. It was only when we waited, in our fashionable robes from the hotel, that it showed its majesty in full, clear of the clouds. So beautiful, just like in the postcards. Also the lakes around the hotel became visible, in what ended up like a beautiful day with clear skies! We sort of felt like we deserved to see it, after our early morning wake up to show our dedication…but clearly it was just enormous LUCK!

After taking a million photos, we then went to the hotel’s public Onsen, to try that experience too. The beauty was that we both had the place for ourselves, I in the female and Bruce in the male section there was no one else but us! Such bliss. There were two pools in each side, one indoor and one outdoor. I spent more time in the outdoor one, while Brucey in the one inside. So relaxing and what a perfect way to start our day!

We then packed our bags, and sent some Peter Rabbit gifts to the Koshiro family via post from the hotel shop, before checking out and getting our 50 minutes bus to Odawara station.

Once arrived we had a quick lunch at the station before getting on our 3 hours Shinkansen to Kyoto, a long train journey but which for once we’ve been looking forward to. So pleasant to travel by Shinkansen! Amazing leg room, nice arm rests and tables, quiet all around, just the best way to travel. Despite an alien sitting some rows in front of us!

We arrived in Kyoto at 6pm, seeing the sunset over the station as we walked 15 minutes towards our Airbnb where we will be staying three nights. As we looked for somewhere to eat we figured out that everything closes quite early here, dinner is often from 5:30 to 8:30 or 9pm maximum. We were running out of options after trying a few of the locals, and we decided in the end to stop at a random one which made savoury pancakes called Okonomiyaki, that they cook in front of you on a hot plate which is built in the middle of the table. A very interesting taste, again something we never tried and we are loving discovering new sides of the Japanese cuisine that we weren’t aware of! If you thought that Japan is only about sushi you were certainly wrong, the variety and tastyness of food here is quite spectacular!

Filled and happy we then quickly stopped at the supermarket to get some supplies for our fridge and our upcoming breakfasts. I did find my new personal favourite… green tea KitKat! So OISHY (delicious)!

Kyoto Day 1

We woke up a bit later than expected since we turned off the alarm at 7am instead of snoozing it! Oops! Before we knew it, it was 9am… By the time we had breakfast with some tasty cheese breads and chocky biscuits as the Italian tradition wants, we ended up leaving the flat at 11am. We walked to the bus station and then got the bus for about half an hour (very busy bus!) until the first temple we visited called Honen-in – one of the few free attractions in this city.

Already from the first one we realised how busy and touristy Kyoto is, so we decided to blend in and get an ice-cream (as you can see I am officially green tea addicted, I might need detox patches soon!) and take a cheesy selfie. After this temple we wondered to Ginkakuji which had a nice path to be followed around, some nice views and beautiful zen gardens and trees.

After that we walked on the path of philosophy or philosopher’s path, Tetsugaku-no-michi. The path is lovely, on the canal, with beautiful nature and trees and some stunning cherry blossoms at their last stretch. A bit ruined by the amount of tourists and selfie sticks. Nice to see some (but not too many and not too touristy) artists drawing and painting along the river selling their work. Big koi carp swam along the river but we were a bit worries about them since the water level was incredibly low.
We stopped for a super quick lunch along the river in a nice little spot to have ramen. Brucey was amazed that you can also get hot coffee from the magic vending machines.


After lunch we continued south and visited the Nanzenji temple, then Shoren-in which was our favourite and then ended the afternoon by walking around the Maruyama-Koen park where the oldest cherry tree in Kyoto is situated. Along the way we met some beautiful dogs called Shiba, which made us miss Jenko-Jenkins rather a lot.

We kept walking towards some of the roads in the Gojo area, famous for entertainment and we were lucky enough to spot a geisha walking in the street in her beautiful bright blue kimono. We didn’t want to take a photo from the front as I read they have been complaining about tourists bothering them with their silly selfie sticks but we did take a sneaky one from the back.

We then had a stroll along Pontocho, a little tiny road filled with pretty lanterns and restaurants. We had a beer at A Bar, famous on the Lonely Planet but which looked pretty empty before dinner. It was a bit of a mission to find, we read it’s open until 5am on Saturday, hopefully they get more clients than now otherwise it must be tough to keep it open without getting bored!
After struggling for a bit to find a place to eat since trip advisor doesn’t seem to work so well here, we ended up in a recommended restaurant called Tagoto where we tried for the first time Kaiseki which is a kind of Japanese haute cuisine – a series of dishes chosen to highlight the freshest ingredients of each season.
Interesting and very unusual but we enjoyed the overall experience. Walk home was about 20 minutes and then bed time after walking 20km today.

Day 2
Woke up at 8:45 again and left the flat after breakfast at 11. We decided to visit first the Fushima Inari shrine, which includes a walk in the mountain with 1000 gates! It was pretty and evocative but too crowded.


After that it was already lunch time and we decided to get back towards the centre where we visited and had a walking lunch in the Nishiki food market. We tried some delicious sashimi scallops and tuna and some other random foods never heard or seen before. Including balls with red bean paste and green tea powder, mini octopus with quail egg boiled in lieu of their head, bean bread, and some fried thingies with fish and potatoes. Again very interesting. The only downside is that we didn’t recover from the walking since our lunch was standing and walking. We just had a 15 minutes rest in a coffee shop.

After lunch we popped into Dairu department store and had a look at the huge basement floor which sold some very random posh desserts and then moved by bus for half an hour towards the golden pavillion, Kinkakuji temple. Very beautiful but again far too crowded to be fully enjoyable.


Lastly we decided to get to the last stop at kiyomizudera temple, where we saw the sunset and some beautiful views of the city from above.


Tired and hungry we then walked 20 minutes to get to the Pontocho area to have dinner and in the end we picked an italian place (Amore) to have a pizza and a break from the delicious Japanese meals in a lovely road south of Pontocho. Especially after our last two meals with random dishes we were happy to get back to something simple and reliable!
Another nice walk home all the way along the canal, very quiet and pretty. The type of dark and empty road you would avoid if you were in other countries but Japan feels so safe we didn’t even think about it!
Sleepy times since tomorrow we leave our airbnb to go to Nara.

Nara
We left our Airbnb at 10am and walked to Kyoto station where we got our JR train to Nara and got there in 45 minutes. We arrived and it started raining, which made us get a cab to our ryokan to leave our luggage since check in is between 3pm and 10pm. After we left again and stopped for lunch before starting our half day walk recommended by the Lonely Planet that covered most of Nara’s must see sights. Lunch was tasty, in a bakery where we got some sandwiches and pastry that you could heat up yourself in a little toaster, a very popular spot amongst locals. After lunch we started in the park, where we met the first deer and we stopped to feed them. They are national treasure here, and they roam around freely and are very (if not too much) used to humans. The biscuits for them cost 150 yen per pack and they finish quickly since as soon as you buy them you get followed by 5 of them starting to bite off your jacket and umbrella asking for food. They are almost quite aggressive! They also ate another tourists map, which was very amusing.


We then walked in the first garden called Isui-en which was beautiful and empty of tourists which was a huge plus despite the rain. Japanese gardens are so pretty and always so accurate and in order.

We then continued towards temples, shrines, and of course we visited the main temple which contains the giant buddha, which is a statue that weighs 500 tonnes and it’s 15 metres tall. It was very impressive. Nara is a little gem, all the walks are in beautiful forests, with deers always walking around you, and there is one gorgeous temple after another, with pretty gardens and stunning views. It is like being in a fairytale! It’s touristy but nowhere near Kyoto, and it still has an authentic, rough, countryside feel to it which makes it special. We really loved our day here and are happy that we planned to come. We had a super early dinner tired from all our walking even though we only walked 15km today, I think we are starting to accumulate the tiredness of many days of walking.


After finding that many restaurants were closed on a Monday, we ended up at Maguro Koya which is famous for Otoro, premium fatty tuna sashimi. The place is very small and the kitchen is far from clean, but the owner Hiroshi is a real character and he’s been in business for 38 years. The tuna is the best we’ve had, so delicious it melts in your mouth (Toro means melt I think in Japanese). Price was also a reasonable £25 in two. After dinner we got back to our ryokan which was nice and clean, simple with shared bathroom, had a shower and bed time since tomorrow we wake up early to get to Hiroshima!

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