Kyoto

The old capital of Japan, a world heritage city full of historic culture, ancient temples and landscaped gardens, bamboo, traditional customs and geishas. At least that was the picture I had in my head during the picturesque and rapid trip on the Shinkansen ‘Bullet Train’ from Tokyo.

Arriving in Kyoto could be the same as arriving in any modern post-war city in Japan. Lots of concrete everywhere and a disgusting giant tower with a viewing platform. I felt like I was in Las Vegas. The taxi ride to the hotel didn’t get any better. It felt more like a suburb of Tokyo full of modern constructions.

Kyoto is a world heritage city and is full of historic culture, with 2000 temples and shrines and countless gardens. It’s just all hidden from view. Large parts of the city have been modernized, many historic homes didn’t survive WWII and aren’t practical today.

During WWII major cities were targeted in bombing raids, with many burning due to the extensive wood constructions used in traditional housing. Kyoto was surprisingly spared, however, the city considered itself a potential target. This unfortunately led to the deliberate destruction of many traditional wooden houses to prevent widespread fires in case of bombings. Large bells in many of the temples were melted down for use by the military. Sadly many of these were hundreds, and some thousands, of years old and irreplaceable.

Sakura Madness



One of the major attractions is the Sakura, cherry blossoms, that happen in early-mid April. Kyoto has an amazing number of cherry trees, on many of the city's streets, by the main river and in countless temples and gardens. There are cherry trees everywhere and in Sakura season Kyoto turns white and fragrant. Some of the temples have entire orchards of cherry trees, in a landscape centuries old.

Blossoms are subject to nature's rhythm and the weather and so timing can vary. By the time we arrived in Kyoto, during a rather wet April, most of the Sakura had finished in the city center.

Various websites track the blossoms, the Hyatt Regency even had a Sakura cam showing daily photographs from the best locations. Fortunately there were a few sites still in bloom and we visited Ninna-ji, a temple and garden packed full of Sakura.



During this annual event local residents come out in force to celebrate, lots of Japanese visit too and far flung tourists flock to experience the Sakura madness. You’d think it was all very romantic, sat underneath blossoms, and it is, but the Japanese also ensure this ritual caters well for the men too. This is achieved by complimenting the experience with beer and sake. At the larger temples and shrines you don’t even need to bring your own. Just turn up and there are stalls selling snacks, tea, beer and sake. Sit down underneath a tree, enjoy the views, falling blossoms and cool refreshing beer or, if you need something stronger, sake. There’s even waiting service so you don’t have to lose your spot.

Walking Tours

The best way to explore and see many of Kyoto’s historic sites is by foot. Many sites are closely located, once you reach them. After a few days of exploring different areas of the city, crossing off a few shrines or gardens each day, you soon realize it will take well over a year to visit the majority of sites.

Higashiyama



Our guidebook highly recommended Higashiyama as the premier must visit district of Kyoto. Unfortunately so did every other guidebook as the place was absolutely packed with both local and foreign tourists. The area also attracts schools for days out, so add a couple of thousand school children to the mix.



We started off walking up a quaint street, Chawan-zaka, towards Kiyomizu-dera, a Buddhist temple at the top of a hill providing great views over Kyoto. Since the area attracts so many people the street was packed full of shops.


Lots of people + lots of shops = very hard to walk up the hill.

Fortunately most visitors were heading towards the Kiyomizu-dera temple. Once we’d done this we heading back and turned right towards Ninen-zaka, a street full of traditional houses, shops and teahouses but without the crowds.



Gion District



This was a nighttime walk starting off at the Yasaka-jinja shrine. Besides the usual places of worship, hall, bell and gates, this shrine had a stage for various religious performances. Many parts of the shrine are lit up with lanterns, these days with modern light bulbs, including the center stage which is surrounded on each side by 3 tiers of lanterns. With barely anyone around at night it’s a calm and serene environment. Night time worship could be the way to go.

A short walk from the Yasaka shrine are the many streets and alleys of Gion. This area is famous as a geisha district. Here you can find streets of traditional Japanese houses, some are tea houses, bars and restaurants. These houses are a hidden world to foreigners, no more bright lights of neon, no menus with pictures or plastic food. You can forget peering in too, as there are no windows with a view.



Ironically these streets are packed with tourists, walking up and down Gion, not hoping to get into anywhere and not really admiring the wonderful traditional architecture. No, tourists are all hoping to get a glimpse of a geisha as they scurry from one house to their next engagement.



Arthur Golden’s fictitious work Memoirs of a Geisha was predominately set in Gion. This portrayed geishas as high class prostitutes, something which apparently is not true. Geishas are entertainers schooled in traditional arts. Part of the confusion in Western culture is that prostitutes dress very similar to geishas, distinguished only by wearing their bow on their front instead of their back.



Close to Gion is Pontochō, a narrow alleyway packed with restaurants and bars. Many of these don’t cater for tourists but for the adventurous you can try your luck and if they let you in, try out the phrase book once you have determined the cuisine or just point. We had some really good yakitori here and did see a very drunk local fall out of a bar, before picking himself up and falling over again.

Arashiyama & Sangano

This is located on the outskirts of the city after a short ride on JR railway. Arashiyama is a delightful walking tour with too many temples and shrines to choose from including a stunning bamboo forest. The area now caters well for tourists with many individual shops selling local goods including many items made from bamboo. Cups made out of bamboo, items carved out of bamboo, lanterns carved out of larger bamboo poles, boxes, mats, bamboo cutlery and the list goes on.



One of the highlights was the bamboo groves where you are surrounded by forest of densely packed bamboo reaching into the sky. When looking up you are bathed in a green light from all the canopy of leaves. When the wind blows the sound of rustling leaves surrounds you and ‘clacking’ noises occur intermittently as the tall bamboo trunks collide.

Nijō Jinya Inn



Just south of Nijō Castle this small inn is one of the oldest surviving houses in Kyoto from the 17th century, Nijō Jinya. The owner of this inn clearly was incredibly paranoid. The inn catered to guests, such as feudal lords and samurai, worried about assassination. The inn is full of special designs. If 007, MI6 and Q were around back then, this would be it. Just about every room had secret observation areas and trap doors for samurai guards. Even the sliding doors had special designs to make subtle audible noises to warn occupants of any entry.

Tours are by appointment only and we needed an interpreter to visit as well. Photos were strictly forbidden, but it is still worth the visit.

The Kyoto National Museum

Besides the temples, shrines and gardens Kyoto has a few museums. After being thoroughly soaked during one of our walks we decided to avoid the rain and visited the The Kyoto National Museum. They had a special exhibit of a 18th century painter Kyosai and decided to check out some traditional Japanese art.

Traditional it was not as Kyosai turned out to be a caricaturist with a sense of humor. One of the most bizarre and amusing pieces was a giant scroll entitled ‘Fart Battle’. The start shows lots of flatulent food being cooked and eaten to enable a fart battle as enjoyment for the palace. As the food is eaten the participants use giant sacks to capture the noxious gases which are in turn passed up to the front line and released. Others run straight into the field, turn around and fart.

Nishiki Market



This is a covered market, great for a rainy day, selling a wide range of local made goods, from modern and traditional clothes to lucky cats. The more interesting attraction is the fresh food, from fresh fish and seafood to live tiny crabs and fugu (puffer fish). It’s great to walk down and sample the wide variety of cuisine from many of the food stalls and you could get really fresh sashimi direct from some of the fishmongers.



Japan is fanatical about coffee and besides the Western coffee chains establishing themselves in major cities there are a large number of local and independent coffee shops. We came across a great one at the end of the market that sold regular filter coffee but had detailed instructions on how to choose your coffee. Once you pick your coffee they freshly grind the beans and brew it on the spot.


Flowchart coffee at its best!

I must admit after 5 nights here we’d only touched the surface of Kyoto. With 2000 temples to visit I could easily come back. Beyond the initial concrete impression Kyoto has so much to offer. We just caught the beauty of the Sakura and I’d love to come back and see the colors of autumn. A world heritage site with so much to explore, I just need at least a year or two to cover it all.