Day 6 - Kyoto - Nightingale floors

W: Eimi-san provides a light breakfast at Hanakiya: yoghurt and toast. Today we had crab shaped sweet bread to toast. Then for something more substantial we headed out for a Japanese style breakfast of rice, natto, miso soup, salad, nori, and a raw egg and cold tea. I couldn't go near the raw egg though.

Walked around the back streets a while then took the subway (2 trains, 2 stops) to Nijo-jo an enormous "castle", although it's really more like a palace, set in expansive and beautiful gardens.

T: After taking off our shoes we shuffled along the nightingale floors, so called because they squeak as you walk and sound like birdsong. It was designed to warn the Shogun of intruders. There are also hidden compartments where ninja could spring out to surprise attackers (just like on the old Samurai movies).

The reception rooms are covered with amazing 17th century painted screens. A Japanese visitor stopped to point out something about the screens in one of the rooms but I'm afraid we didn't understand what she was trying to tell us.

After the castle we spent quite a while touring the gardens, then headed back to the centre of town. Along the way we found one of the vegetarian restaurants recommended in the guidebook, Obanzai, but it was a bit early for lunch. By the time we were ready to eat it was way too far to come back. We walked for miles... we should have taken the subway.

W: Almost collapsed into a Starbucks as we'd had no coffee all day and were exhausted.

Bought some more cute handcrafts, an owl and ping-pong creatures, then walked down a lovely street alongside a canal. Found Tower Records and - somehow - located a Kahimi Karie CD My Suitor that I wanted as well as Isabelle Antena's En Cavalle and Kahimi Karie's 5songsondvd.

Discovered my new fave band to be Capsule who seem to be taking up the Pizzicato 5 torch. Found six Pizzicato 5 DVDs but will decide which ones to get later - it's too expensive to buy them all.

Tony has gone off to cash some travellers cheques, having carefully memorised how to ask for this in Japanese, then we go for kitsune udon at what has become a regular fast food place in Sanjo.

T: I'm so tired that I manage to spill an entire cup of barley tea in my lap and all over the table. Many sumimasens later we decide to head for the Kyoto Handicaft Centre. Passed some more craft shops on the way and picked up yet more cute things from the seemingly endless array.

The handicraft centre turns out to be mostly disappointing with several floors of tourist tat, although we do manage to find a quite lovely wooden samurai toothpick holder and a small tanuki statue. Wayne also gets a free postcard which is somewhat underwhelming.

W: To say the least...

T: Started the long walk back to Hanakiya, passing by Heian Shrine then through some gardens to the Kyoto Art Gallery, then past Shoren-in and Chion-in temples. It's getting late so we decide to visit the temples tomorrow.

W: Walking through more backstreets in the Higashiyama district we chance upon more cute Japanese stuff. We're becoming mildly obsessed.

The streets are crowded with Japanese tourists, and we also spot several fake Maiko, sort of apprentice Geisha. Eimi-san had warned us that they might not be the real thing.

Girls can pay to be made up in traditional kimono and make up and wander around for an hour or so getting their photos taken. Bought some furoshiki Japanese cloths from a lovely old lady running a store on her own.

After a rest we walked back into town, bought some more mochi and found a little cafe for dinner. It was like a 1950s Japanese diner with laminex tables and a TV in the corner.

Then explored the Teramachi arcades some more. We could be happily lost in here for days.

In one of the arcades there was a temple that seemed to largely be about selling souvenirs and had coin in the slot fortunes, including one slightly scary one with a snake-like mechanical wooden creature.

Bought a Puffy CD single (3") for Y100 (it has a great Rodney Greenblat cover) and decided to finish the evening with chocolate croissants from Choco Cro which we ate by the canal. Wandered back along the canal and through the narrow lantern lit lanes of Pontocho.

Even chanced a short cut back to Hanakiya (and it worked).


Next > Day 7 - Kyoto - Lovely day, lovely socks