track our trek

so in our 7 nights on the road so far, we’ve stayed in 5 different hotels/hostels…we’re getting pretty good at getting settled in our digs, combing the internet for the next night’s options, then making calls to book the next morning before we head out sightseeing. turns out september 18 is a national holiday in japan…hence our difficulty booking more than one night at a time in these places. we’re hoping to have better luck in the weeks to come so we’re not on the move every night! we spent our last 2 nights in a nice spot called hotel roku roku…a bit of a strange set up though…we were in separate single sex dorm rooms this time…the hotel has a dorm building with guest rooms, and the owner opens his home (1/2 a mile up the hill) for guests to use as a lounge/tea room. the home is beautiful & jun, the owner, is very gracious. the hotel is extremely clean, w/ laundry, 2 laptops in the lobby and lan connections in the rooms. but the lobby is uncomfortable for lounging, and the place is WAY too far away from the central train station (1hr by local bus, 35 mins by express bus.)

we spent 4 great days in kyoto visiting shinto shrines and buddhist temples. i think we both enjoyed kyoto much more than tokyo for its history. if our wallets could bear it, we could easily spend two weeks in this city alone! it is overwhelming to visit these temples and know that some of them were built 800-1200 years ago! friday  we saw kinkakuji temple (the golden pavilion). day two we saw ryoan-ji temple…it’s zen rock garden is one of the most famous in kyoto, and fushimi inari shrine…it’s got miles and miles of red torii gates marching up the mountain …& we splurged on conveyor belt sushi and sake for lunch! sunday we took the train an hour south to nara city to see the big buddha at todai-ji temple. wow! pictures can never do it justice. it was first built in 732, burned down and was rebuilt twice, the last time in the mid-1500’s. when it was last rebuilt, it was built at two thirds its original size, and it is still the largest wooden building in the world!! the walk through the numerous temples in nara park (also known as deer park because deer are considered sacred there) took about four hours…there are hundreds and hundreds of deer roaming the park & people buy deer food to feed them. we got bum-rushed by a deer who was convinced our map was food…so he got a mouthful of paper & we had to navigate without a map the rest of the way! jokes…