Kyoto day 2

Day 2 was a real achievement. Like a real real achievement in comparison to all my travels (not that I have done that many!). We visited 6 temples and 1/5 of a garden in A day. ONE day. And we thought we might only do 4 at max.

Anyway, because Kyoto has countless temples & shrines (17 of them UNESCO recognized), we spent the night before planning out our journey (as we always do :P). Since I only had 2 days left in Kyoto, I highlighted the place that I thought we should really cover to make the trip 'complete'. I personally only had 2 places on my list that I must visit, which was Kinkakuji temple and Kiyomizu-dera. Kinkakuji because it's absolutely breathtaking and Kiyomizu-dera because I've seen it on someone's photo album.

Being a big city with multiple tourist spots scattered around, they have something called the sightseeing bus which accepts the 'City Bus All-day Pass' at only 500 yen (A single bus trip cost a flat rate of 220yen). As we wanted to go to quite a few places, we decided to go ahead with the great bargain and got ourselves the day pass from our hotel's reception. The only downside of it was, we had to walk to Nijo-jo to actually get on the bus as there was no bus routes near our hotel.

There are 5 areas of interest covered by the bus -Arashimaya, Kinkakuji, Okazaki, Ginkakuji and Higashiyama. We started our day with a visit to Kinkakuji temple which is located northwest to Kyoto Station.

Kinkakuji

Kinkakuji is also known to us as the Golden Pavillion, a famous icon of Kyoto. It is the temple that one see in every Kyoto brochure. Built in the compounds of the Rokuon-ji Temple, the whole compound was made World Cultural Heritage in 1994.

When we first got there, it was fairly quiet with a group of students which made it easy for us to take pictures of the pavillion. But not long after that, the place was crowded with tourist who wasn't all that polite or gracious. *sigh* Lucky for me (or them), someone got me a hot coffee on that cold morning, otherwise I might have lost it when I was pushed to the fence as I was walking out!! Needless to say, we spent the rest of the visit trying to avoid the group.

Fudo-do, hall dedicated to God of Fire

The wish/thanking 'board' next to Fudo-do where one of us made a wish

Couldn't resist a picture with the fortune machine

Without a doubt, this place must see a lot of tourist!! Look at the fortune machines. There's actually 4 there, one in Japanese obviously, but look at the other 3 I took a picture with. One in English, Korean & Chinese. Talk about marketing skills. I obviously got the English one. Apparently, if the fortune that one gets isn't good, one's suppose to tie them to the strings in an allocated place nearby. Lucky for me, I got to keep my 'paper'.

Along the way to Ryoanji Temple

Ryoanji Temple, located a few minutes away from Kinkakuji by bus, is yet another heritage site. Famous for it's zen garden, this temple was originally the Fujiwara family's. The entrance is a gate called 'san men' which brings us a lake into view on the left. The lake is Kyoyochi Pond, made in the late 12th century which used to house mandarin ducks making Ryoanji also known as Oshidoridera, temple of mandarin ducks.

Kyoyochi Pond

The famous rock garden

This is the famous garden of the Ryoanji Tepmpe, a rectangular shaped dry garden consisting of just 15 rocks and white sand. This garden ws apparently laid out in in late 1400s by Soami, a painter and gardener. It is said that what one sees in the garden depends on how one interpretes the layouts, and one of the famous interpretation is a mother tigress leading her cubs away from a dragon by swimming across a stream (or that's what I can roughly remember). To be honest, all I could 'see' was... random rocks on a prettily raked white sand. *I obviously have not meditated in my life :P* No doubt the raked sands make the place looked extremely zen.

Walkways in Ryoanji's compounds

To be honest, I wasn't that all impressed with Ryoanji (and subsequently the other zen temples), so we didn't spend a long time there. We moved on to Ninnaji which is located even more northwest compared to the other two temples. Once again, we made full use of our day-trip pass :).

At Omuro Gosho of Ninnaji

Ninnaji was found in 888 by a Emporer Uda and was initially started as an imperial residence. We didn't actually pay an entrance fees into the garden *I think we couldn't find any though we weren't looking hard enough*. Most of the compounds seem to be free to public as there wasn't booths or 'entrances' as of such.

Don't know what this is called. It just happened to look very pretty :)

The Pagoda in Ninnaji

It started snowing lightly as we were leaving Ninnaji. Being cold and hungry, we decided to stop for lunch before continuing the rest of the day. We took the bus back to the central area of Kyoto and started looking for a place to eat. It's annoying how everytime we decide to look for food, we can never see one. It's either they're closed, dessert shops or they're fastfood/westerns. And when we are looking for desserts, all we see is food. *sigh*

We spent a really long time wondering before finally settling for a small shop in a side alley near the main road. Although the shop was old and small, there was a pretty decent crowd of customers and they had picture and english menus!! :). Sweet.

Noodles with rice krispies *Seems to be popular over here!!*

From there, our next stop was Chion-in. The entrance to Chion-in isn't the same as the one depicted on the map, but instead one has to go through the San-Mon gate which is located just next to the Maruyama Park. Chion-in is the head temple of of the Jodo sect, built in 1234 and is one of the oldest temples around. Standing at 24 metres tall, the San-Mon gate is the Japan's largest temple gate.

The main colossal gate, San-Mon gate

Chion-in

I was only convinced that this is Chion-in after asking a security guard that was standing nearby, as the it looked to be on a different spot in the tourist map that we were holding. The power of hand language and my years of experience communicating with NESB patients and family, has finally come of use.

Chion-in is made up from a very large area, with many smaller temples/shrines surronding the main temple itself. Entry to most areas were free, which was really good seeing that there was many pretty sights to see. The only part that I dreaded about this temple was it's multiple stairs which was huge and everywhere. Definitely something that I wouldn't mind on any normal day, it was taking a toll on my sore knees after the week of skiing.

More steps to another smaller praying area

Inside the praying area Aren't those things pretty? :0)

Somewhere inside Chion-in

From there we walked into Maruyama Park as recommended by the JNTO walk-route. It was located just next to the temple which was really convenient. However, the park didn't look at pretty as we expected it to be, there was not much flowers but just trees and the park looked rather bare. Perhaps we were there in the wrong season (again!). *I didn't personally take any pictures due to the freezing weather. I decided that my fingers were more important than pictures :P*. So we made our way towards Kodaiji Temple instead.

Rickshaw & Kimonos (both man & woman)

The walk to Kodaiji from Chion-in was a fairly nice walk. It was filled with both locals and tourist, and some of the locals were dressed in kimonos, both males and females. It was like a game of 'spot the kimonos*. Lucky for us, we spotted a couple of geisha/maiko walking down the street opposite us. We took several shots of them while they were walking from afar and then contemplated asking them for a picture. Lucky for us, they obliged and so we had a picture with them :)!! They were absolutely gorgeous, made up just like what we see in tv, adorned with all the pretty accessories on their hair and their traditional slippers.

One with the geishas/maikos

No thanks to us, the two poor girls was then stopped by multiple people for photos after us. We think everyone was just too polite to ask them for a picture before, and when Elvira asked and we got one, everyone started asking them. As we were leaving the area, the geishas/maikos were still standing there taking pictures! *I apologize if you were late to your engagements :(*

After that, four (or rather 2) very happified people walked towards Kodaiji Temple. Formerly known as Kodaijusho-zenji Temple, it is located about 30 minutes walk (with distractions :P) from Choin-in. Established in 1605 in memory of Toyotomi Hideyoshi by his wife, the construction of this temple was financed by Tokugawa Ieyasu, one of the famoous Shoguns in Japan.

Kodaiji Temple

Twirling thingy at the temple grounds

The temple also had a garden just like all the other temples. Redesigned from an older garden located on site by a renowned landscape architect Kobori Ensyu, this garden has been designated as a Place of Historical Importance and Outstanding Scenery by the Japanese Government. A small pavilion is also located next to the pond to allow viewing of the moon's reflection on the surface of the pond. This pavilion is called Kangetsu-Dai, the Moon Viewing Pvabilion.

In the temple garden grounds

Our last temple stop for the day was the famous Kiyomizudera ( Ching Sui Chi or Pure Water Temple). Built at the edge of a steep cliff, the wooden structure receives a lot of tourist everyday and is recognized as a UNESCO World Heritage site (yes, another one) in 1994. To get to Kiyomizudera, we had to walk uphill but the walk was fairly pleasant as there was many quaint shops selling souvenirs and food along the way.

Entrance to Kiyomizu-dera *Isn't it a pretty picture? With the gate, the tree & the sky*

Couldn't resist taking a picture of the flowers.

Although we were there fairly late in the day, the place was still packed with tourist and I could definitely understand why. Being at the top of a cliff, one could also see the town from it's famous wooden terrace. The famed veranda is supported by hundred of wooden pillars. It was also here that we saw more girls dressed in kimonos and took more pictures! :)

One of the famous terrace

Another picture with the ever friendly people :)

Behind the main hall was a shrine dedicated to the deity of love, also known as Jishu Shrine. I think the place was actually closed when we got there, but because they did not block off the stairway and also as people kept entering, we followed them. And I am glad we did.

Stairs to Jishu Shrine

Jishu Shrine

Slightly off the opposite of the shrine laid to rocks opposite each other several metres apart, which apparently grants wishes if one is able to walk from one to the other with their eyes closed. A lot of people were just staring at the two rocks (us inclusive) and debating about if it was possible to do. In the end, I tried it out but I was so focused on getting there without falling flat on my face that I forgot to make a wish until I left the temple. Talk about being forgetful. LOL. Luckily, it was just for funs :P.

Another picture with the temple

The 3 streams & us

At the bottom of the hall, there was a waterfall, Otowa-no-taki, that channels into 3 streams before entering the pond. These 3 streams are said to represent health, longevity and success and one can only make 2 wishes from the streams as making 3 would symbolize greed and misfortune will happen instead. When I first saw the place from the terrace, it was packed with people but by the time we got there, maybe because it was fairly late, there wasn't much people. I couldn't resist having a go at it and of course, a compulsory photo shot of us while we were there :). Me being not greedy, only had water from 1 stream :P. Although I have no idea which one I took it from.

Walking back to town

The umbrellas really caught my eye

I was walking down the hill with half-held expectations as I wanted to see a shop that we've passed by while going to Kiyomizudera. Thinking to myself along the way, "Please still be open, please still be open". *I'm such a kid sometimes. SIGH.* And it was still open :D.

The shop that I'm talking about? It sells :

Totoro
Ponyo
Kiki's delivery service

We obviously spent some time in the shop but didn't end up getting anything from there. For some reason, Ponyo doesn't seem as cute in... 3Ds. Not entirely sure if the shop has any affliation witht he director or the museum, but the stuffs that was sold there was pretty similiar to what we saw in the museum a few days later. At the same price too.

And one with Totoro with the famous bus stop

Our dinner for that night was kind of a snack-around type. We weren't really starving at dinnertime so when we went back into the city, we just wandered around and we came across this shop that had.... decorations which was quite... unique. We didn't take much notice until we were inside after ordering our food. There was mannequins in the shop that sat with the customers.. and some of the ornament, which were dolls, had their clothes torn apart. A little too bizarre and eerie I have to admit. We left pretty much as soon as we finished our food. The shop sold mainly okinomiyakis and we ordered 1 to share between the 4 of us, as we only wanted to have a try and it actually wasn't too bad.

Okinomiyaki

We finished off the day with another dinner at another izakaya. Man, I can really get used to eating at izakayas :).