Kyoto Day 1

Among the four cities we visited in Japan, my favorite was Kyoto not only because of the majestic temples, but also for its specialty in green tea. Green tea is one of my favorite flavors. When I'm having bubble tea, I order green tea instead of black or red. When there's green tea panna cotta or green tea tiramisu on the menu, I almost always get that. So, when I was in Kyoto and saw all these green tea flavored drinks and desserts, I almost never stopped eating. In Kyoto, they did green tea flavored soft serve ice cream PERFECTLY.

We arrived in Kyoto past lunch. So, we were already quite hungry. Our first destination was the Kiyomizu-dera temple. I had read in a blog that there are shops and eateries along the path to the temple, so I suggested that we looked for a place to eat on the way to the temple. There weren't very many restaurants, but even then, we had trouble deciding where to eat until we settled on this one place that looked clean and had diners inside. Most of the other places were empty. For some reason, every time MM and I aren't eating family style and had to order our own dishes, we end up ordering the same thing. So, this is what we got.

The tempura at this place was delicious! Even though we already went to Daikokuya in Tokyo, which we think is the best tempura we've tasted, we still enjoyed this one. The tempura was served with matcha salt on the side, which we loved so much that we asked for more salt. Yep, we asked for more salt and the old lady was kind enough to give us more. We looked for matcha salt everywhere after dining in this restaurant. We had a really hard time looking for it since we didn't know how to say salt in Japanese and everyone we asked just gave us blank stares. We eventually found it in a basement supermarket in one of the department stores by the Kyoto station. The cold soba noodles that came with this dish were also delicious. The entire meal was very satisfying, even if it was in a random restaurant.

Right by the entrance to the temple, there was a fancy looking shop that sold green tea baum cake. Not only that, they also sold green tea soft serve on top of green tea baum cake. I just had to get it! Best dessert of the trip. Where can I find this in Seattle?!?!?

Finally, we made it to the temple after being distracted by the tri-flavored kitkats displayed on store fronts, people serving free tastes of mochi and sweet green tea and lots of trinkets and snacks to spend our money on.

Although we didn't pay to enter the temple and hike the temple grounds, we took our time taking pictures by the entrance. The temple is situated on a hill and surrounded by forestland. I think I read that there are trails around the temple you can hike in for two hours to get a better view of the vicinity and the city, but we were happy to just stay where we were. Since this was our fifth day of touring Japan, we know how sore our feet can get by the end of the day. We eventually found this very picturesque spot we spent most of our time in posing for pictures.

Since it was starting to get late and the shops were closing, we went back down to shop. After that, we walked towards the Gion district to look for an ice cream shop in Hanamikoji-dori. The receptionist at the hotel told us that Gion was only a ten minute walk from Kiyomizu-dera, but we must have really short legs because it must have taken us around 20 mins to get there. We spotted another temple up an alley along the way to Gion and made a detour to check it out. Because it was getting dark, the streets were almost deserted and the temple was already closed. Still, it was nice to stroll along quiet streets away from the noise of the city.

We walked a bit more and finally reached the beginning (or the end, depending on where you're coming from) of Shijo-dori. Our hotel receptionist gave us a map of where the ice cream shop was so we followed the instructions on the map in search of ice cream. We walked towards Hanamikoji-dori where the Kinana ice cream shop was. I obviously didn't do enough research because I didn't know when I got there that Hanamikoji-dori was a popular area for spotting geishas. It was dark and there were many black cabs holding men in suits trying to get through. There were also many tourists with their big SLR cameras roaming the streets. Only when we spotted a geisha walking briskly down the street did we realize what all the tourists were hanging around here for. A lot of them were just standing around pacing this way and that, holding there cameras ready to snap a photo of a geisha dressed in a kimono and in full make-up. So, I got excited and MM got excited with me. We sat on a bench outside one of the restaurants and waited for another geisha to pass us by. I adjusted the settings on my camera, but I didn't really know what settings to use so I can focus on moving subjects at night. When the second geisha passed us by, I was only able to capture a really blurry photo of her. MM even indulged me by walking as fast as the geishas were walking so I can practice taking pictures in the dark and adjust to the correct settings. Sadly though, we only saw two geishas that evening.

Hanamikoji-dori

The alleys in Hanamikoji-dori were dark and quiet so we weren't very comfortable roaming around too much. We didn't find Kinana ice cream shop that evening and none of the restaurants seemed appealing enough for dinner, so we headed back to the station and looked for a place to eat there instead.

Shijo-dori

The Kyoto station has very beautiful architecture. Once you get to the fourth or fifth floor, there's going to be open space above you with no ceiling. Escalator after escalator will lead you straight up to the 10th and 11th floors. Because I am very afraid of heights, I started panicking when we got to the 7th floor, noticing how far above the ground we were. MM stood behind me so I won't feel like I would fall on my back and plummet back to the 4th floor. And once we reached a floor with access to an elevator, we took the elevator the rest of the way to the restaurant floors. We decided on ramen that evening. I was still full from our late lunch so MM and I just shared a ramen and a plate of gyoza. Yum!

So, that was our day 1 in Kyoto. We might have walked around the station a bit more and checked out the department stores - we haven't grown tired of them yet :)