DJ 989 is boarding all passengers...

 A lot of people who went to Japan before me spoke a lot about Kyoto and Tokyo. One thing that I found they spoke very little of was the JR pass. For me this was an important necessity and if you haven't been to Japan before it's best you get informed about this JR pass.

The JR pass can only be bought outside of Japan by tourists. So before you fly over there (about one month before you go) ask your travel agent to order you the JR pass. The pass basically allows you to travel for free on the trains and shinkansens all over Japan. For a 14 day pass it cost me about $700 - now I know you might think this is expensive but it is great value if you intend to travel all over Japan - from the east to the west. When you collect your JR pass from the travel agent it looks like a plane ticket or raffle ticket, you have to exchange it for the actual pass (shown in picture) when you arrive in Japan at a JR office. We exchanged ours at the Kansai airport and from there it was free train rides all the way.... no hassle of lining up to buy tickets!

After a ten hour flight, a 1 hour train ride and a 15 minute walk we arrived to our Hostel in Kyoto Japan. We caught up on much needed sleep and woke up to start our adventure.

We bought an all day bus ticket and grabbed a map from the hostel and hopped on the bus heading towards Sanjusangendo Temple famous for its 1001 Buddhist statues. It was outside this temple where we met "the kids". My partner had accidentally dropped some of his money on the ground and a boy picked it up and returned it to him. He was with his school friends and they were all waiting at the same bus stop heading towards Kiyomizudera Temple. In 2007 over a million people had to vote on the 7 new world wonders. The Kiyomizudera was 1 of 21 wonders people had to vote on. We asked if we could follow them to the temple because we were heading there ourselves - sure enough they were more than happy too.

It turned out that these kids were from Yokohama (5hrs away from Kyoto) on a 2 day school excursion. It was their last day and they had to visit 5 temples in Kyoto. At Kiyomizudera Temple the eight of us bought a ticket to what we thought was the entrance to the grand wooden temple. We were wrong! We ended up heading down a deep staircase in absolute pitch darkness - we could not even see our hands. We all held on to the rail - feeling our way to the end of the deep staircase to find.....a large ROCK. A dim light shined aboved it - the eight of us kept laughing, the kids got us to put our hands on the rock and we all made a wish. We headed out of the tunnel and found the real entrance to the temple 300 metres away.

Boy what a view...definitely a must see.

The eight students invited us to join their group to find the last 3 temples on their check list. We agreed and headed off on foot to find the Silver Pavilion aka Ginkakuji. This Silver pavilion took the longest to find. The eight of us got lost and ended up at another temple. You can see in the photo (left) Kenji (boy with glasses - group leader) got really tired and just wanted to arrive at the right place already! We were all thirsty, tired and exhausted but found right bus eventually taking us to the Silver Pavilion.

It was here that they had their pitstop and met their teacher. The teacher must have asked them, "Where did you find these two tourists?" because the kids said "Bus stop." and the teacher started laughing. The Silver Pavilion was under construction when we went inside, but nevertheless the moss garden and zen garden were beautiful.

It started to rain when we came out and by this time we were all hungry. We headed down the ancient kyoto lanes and found a nice restaurant. It was here that I met a waitress who knew how to speak Indonesian. She married an Indonesian man and learned how to speak the language from her husband. It felt fantastic to talk to someone who understood me. She was a lovely woman. I wish I took a photo with her.

The last two temples we had to find was the Golden Pavilion (aka Kinkakuji) and Nijo Castle. The Golden Pavilion cannot be entered as it is surrounded by a lake. It is ranked the number 1 must see place in Kyoto. It was constructed in 1937 and as the name suggest it is a zen temple made of gold (not sure it is real gold though).

The last stop for the eight of us was the Nijo Castle. By the time we reached this place  we were all templed out! Okay it wasn't a temple...the Nijo Castle was more of an ancient palace, it was built by Tokugawa Ieyasu - the most powerful man in Japan in the 1600's. It had this eeriness feeling about it, but nevertheless I was completely zened out. hehe

We bought the kids some japanese cakes as a farewell and thank you present. It was the best start to our Japan adventure.

I knew before coming to Japan I had to go to Fushimi-ku. In Memoirs of a Geisha, Chiyo runs through a trail of tori gates and I thought if I ever went to Japan I would do the exact same thing. Located just 5 minutes by train from central Kyoto I found the gates - Fushimi Inari.

On the same day my partner and I went to Gion; a well known geisha district in Kyoto. I walked in the rain in hopes to see a Geisha...and sure enough there she was....walking home under her umbrella. It's hard to imagine with the world moving in fast forward, such a place of ancient values and culture still exists. It just makes me want to travel back to the period where everyone is still wearing kimonos and you can ride into town and not see a Mc Donalds restaurant.

About 15 minutes on foot from the Gion area we reached Pontocho alley. This narrow lane was home to many geisha and tea houses but now when you walk down this alley you see restaurants, thankfully the traditional architecture still remains to remind you of old Japan.

About 25minutes train ride from Kyoto you can see the bamboo forest Arashiyama. My partner and I took a peaceful stroll down the bamboo forest track eating ice cream - I think we had tried 6 different flavored soft serve ice cream whilst in Japan. You can't get cherry blossom flavoured ice cream in Australia!

All of my girlfriends who went to Japan had told me I should set aside a day to experience a maiko makeover. The place I had originally wanted to go to was closed, so my hostel had arranged an appointment at Maika studio. I think I paid around $80 but I felt it was a bit too rushed. I wouldn't recommend going to that place again. If you book in advance I suggest you try this place:  Yumekoubou the Kiyomizudera studio. A bit more expensive but from what my girlfriend has told me, the service is exceptional.

I had 5 different layers of clothing on and if you wanted to be a geisha I think you had to wear more...it was boiling hot but it was fun watching my partner get freaked out by my white face. hehe

Nara is located just under an hour by JR south of Kyoto. This is one of my favorite days in Japan. Nara is probably most known for its deer - you go to the gift shops and everything has a picture of a deer on it. The second thing it's most known for is the Todai-ji temple. To get there is a bit of a walk. Get a tourist map from when you get off Nara station and head to Nara Park - from there it's a long straight stroll to Todai-ji temple. The temple is home to the largest Buddha statue in Japan, and is also the largest wooden Buddhist Temple in the world. The temple had to go through restorations due to being burnt some time ago, and even though they only restored 3/4 it is still the biggest in the world. The picture on left is just the gate protecting the temple.

When you finally get pass all the deers go insde the temple - you will be in awe at the size of the Buddha. It is much bigger than the Kamakura Buddha near Tokyo. At the Todaiji temple you can do a lap around the statue and see other exhibitions on the floor. One unusual thing we saw was a pole with a hole in it. We had no idea why it was there but people were trying to go through it. I gave it a go too! And so did my partner.

There are other things to see in Nara - museums, pagodas and more temples! There is actually a museum dedicated to Buddhism - but we didn't have time to visit it. We did take a becak ride to the Kasuga Grand Shrine - our becak guy knew very little English, every now and then he would turn around and try to string a sentence together - he was a gem. We felt quite sorry for him because he had to take us up hill. He was sweating quite a bit!

At Kasuga shrine you will see stone lanterns and Rei from Sailor moon! Just kidding. The Kasuga shrine is nestled in the woods, and to get there you have to walk pass 3000 stone lanterns. While following the path my partner and I saw two tourist feed a deer - it was amazing...an I'm not being sarcastic. The lady bowed three times and then the deer did the same - and she fed it! Then the gentleman bowed three times to the deer and it bowed three times to the man. What a clever deer...

My partner and I also did a quick stop to the 5 story pagoda. Nothing that special I didn't think, but it wasn't out of the way. We only spent half a day in Nara, but if you plan to do a full day I suggest having lunch at the lushes green park and visit Nigatsudo - from what I read it has a great view. Here is a map of the area to give you an idea where everything is located.

On our way back to Nara station we got lost. There's actually two Nara stations in Nara. Make sure you get off the bus stop that says JR Nara station. If you do get dropped off at the wrong Nara station, it's just a 10 minute walk through the heavily decorated streets. So win win I guess. =]

My partner and I planed to stay overnight in Miyajima, a couple of hours west of Kyoto. We packed up our luggage and took the JR shinkansen to Hiroshima which is only a few stops before Miyajima.

Once we got to Hiroshima station we left our luggage in the lockers and took a tram ride down to Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park. When you get off the tram the first thing you see is the A-Bomb Dome, one of the few buildings that has been preserved, a monument to the bomb's dreadful power. During WW2 - August 6th 1945, the city was hit by an atomic bomb, there were 140,000 casualties - 69% of the city's buildings were destroyed. If you go to Hiroshima - you must go into the museum, you will be moved and saddened by what happened to this city 64 years ago.

A few of my girlfriends said you feel melancholic and speechless. I definitely was...

At the Peace Memorial Park you will see a statue of a girl holding up a large crane. This statue is dedicated to Sadako Sasaki and the children who lost their lives on that day. Sadako Sasaki was a Japanese girl who lived near Hiroshima she was affected by the A-bomb. She was diagnosed with leukemia. In hospital her best friend Chizuko gave her a piece of gold paper to fold a paper crane - she had hoped that if she folded 1000 cranes she would be granted a wish. She died in 1955.

If you go to the Sadako memorial you will see thousands and thousands of cranes folded by people from around the world, dedicated to Sadako.

My partner and I caught a ferry to Miyajima and stayed overnight - the island is so peaceful and romantic at night. Approaching the island you see the large Tori gate in the middle of the ocean protecting the Itsukushima Shrine. At Miyajima I decided to spoil ourself at a ryokan. We stayed at Iwaso and booked the Japanese Shinkan room (501) the largest room on our floor. We've been staying in hostels and our living space have been quite cramp but when we stepped into our ryokan we were in absolute awe. The room was beautiful! Now I definitely feel like I'm in Japan.

When you stay and Iwaso dinner is included, we had about 11 dishes brought to our room. The meals were so intricate and delicious! At one point I shoved a whole heap of wasabi in my mouth and started crying! After dinner and soaking in the bath my partner and I took a stroll on the island, lit up with lanterns and lights and seeing people in their Japanese bath robes I felt like I just stepped out of an anime.

To be continued...

To be continued...

To be continued...

To be continued...