Kyoto is a beautiful city, and we had a lovely 3 days there. It was our first stop, and so gave us our first impressions of Japan - polite and friendly people, good food and (lots and lots of) temples.
We decided to head to the Imperial Palace first, for the free (obvious bonus...) tour. Unfortunately, Ben failed to take any ID (yes, no passport, driving licence or even credit card!) with him, so could not go in. I soldiered on regardless, and happily reported back that Japanese buildings and gardens look EXACTLY as you imagine them to, and are just like you have seen in films! This was at least some comfort...
Unfortunately it rained for our whole time in Kyoto (bit of a wound after 6 months in sunny, if cold, Beijing), but everyone in Japan seems to own an umbrella, so we fitted right in. Coming from Beijing, I was a fan of all the bikes in Japan, but got caught in a few near misses seeing as everyone there cycles on the pavements! Very strange that such an advanced country has not yet introduced cycle lanes. At least in China, the road-risks are such that you know to be constantly on guard!
The strangest food we had in Kyoto has to be the rice balls. Ben wolfed them down, but the sticky, dense texture just freaks me out. The Chinese put them in a super sweet and sticky dessert/soup thing, but these were a semi-sweet, semi-savoury skewered concoction that I avoided for the rest of the week...
Kyoto is also where we first discovered Japan's micro-bars, that sit c. 8 people (see previous post) and we had a fantastic time cramped into a bar with crazy posters and memorabilia stuck on every available surface.
We took a day trip to Nara, where we found more of the same temples, but this time surrounded by a large number of deer. Very random! We spent a fair amount of time observing the hilarity involved with tourists buying snacks for the deer and getting chased around, nibbled and prodded as a result (usually Japanese teenage girls...).
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