Japan - Kyoto

The local train from Osaka only took half an hour, good job as it was so busy I had to stand the whole way! Anna had a nice comfy seat though... We got to Kyoto's glass house of a station mid morning so we had plenty of time to sort out our onward tickets to Tokyo for two days later.

After several attempts we eventually managed to get hold of our guesthouse owner who insisted we caught a taxi to her place at her expense! So after a ride in a lace doily clad taxi, complete with uniformed cabbie, we arrived in a narrow back street right in the centre of the city. Miss Tani Jr met us and paid for the cab. She then led us up a couple of flights of stairs to a room/appartment so small it was comical. It was all we needed though and surprisingly homely.

We dumped our gear and headed out on foot to tramp miles round the backstreets of Kyoto visiting several temples during the remainder of the day. We even spotted a couple of women dressed as Geishas, they'd probably paid a fair amount for the priviledge! Footsore we returned to our mini-pad to crash onto our futon.

The next morning we set off early to try and beat the crowds at the Golden Pavillion. Unfortunately everyone else had the same idea and the bus there was rammed with school kids and pensioners on their way there too!

After a quick tour of the Golden Pavillion we caught a bus and a train to the Fushimi Inari-Taisha temple. This was one of the most impressive we saw. Its paths are lined for about four kilometres with bright orange Torii arches. They're packed so close in places they almost block out the light!

For dinner we went to a local sushi train restaurant which was excellent. Anna's not so keen on raw fish though so she had to settle for the smoked duck which was pretty good! Tired out from all the walking we crashed early again!