Off to Japan

It’s 10.15 pm after a really magical day...another excursion, this time to Nara - the ancient capital before Kyoto, before Tokyo....thank you Louise for this suggestion...it was a truly great day. It is late but I want to write up before I forget all the things we did. It is about a 45 minute train ride..we left at 9.33am (on the dot) and left to return at 5.57 pm so we had a good long day there. It rained quite heavily in the night, and the air is now clear and it is COOL, even unto wearing jackets some of the day...bliss. And it is pleasant and sunny at times!

Nara is a small manageable town to visit. We got a map at the station which showed how to walk to all the main sights...along a pedestrian street of shops before arriving at the first temple, the Kohfukuji temple and a five storey pagoda. This was impressive but you keep walking on through a park with MANY deer hoping you will feed them (they sell deer food, but we didn’t buy any!) to the Nara National Museum...excellent, many buddhas, ritual bowls...all interesting and well presented. Then we had a refreshment stop before heading on to better and better temples and shrines! First the Todaiji Temple, the biggest wooden structure in Japan...we felt we had heard that before but Amr looked it up and the authorities say it IS! Anyway, it was huge, and had a huge black Buddha flanked by two large gold ones. This area was crowded, with school excursions, tour buses, but not so that it was unpleasant. And it is Saturday..we forget the days, but it didn’t feel different from every other day...So by now we felt we had seen it all, and were following the path that eventually would lead back to the station, when we came to the sign to the Kasuga Taisha Shrine, a world heritage site (all these are world heritage sites) so we took that path and this one was also over the top...it has 2000 stone lanterns surrounding it, and inside the building along the corridors it has1000 bronze lanterns...at the end you go into a darkened room where there are lit lanterns that looks magical once your eyes adjust to the dark.

So what a day!....we walked back to the station looking for a wine bar to relax in...this is a very difficult thing in Japan we have discovered. We could probably have had beer, and many many places for tea, coffee and desserts, but the concept of drinking a glass of wine at 5 pm is a bit alien. We even tried at an Italian trattoria which had wine bottles in the window but were turned away! Finally, having given up and almost at the station we did find a place...it was an eatery of very non Japanese food (pizzas I think) but a very pleasant place to sit, and we did each have a glass of wine before catching the train back to Kyoto. We dined at one of the many restaurants in the shopping/dining area actually in the station building as we weren’t in the mood to go walking and searching, and had a really excellent meal...so a happy end to a great day. Now back in hotel room and watched the Royal Wedding as we showered and got ready for bed!

I have just remembered a few other things....along the way we did a little shopping! Between temples we came across a Mont-Bell shop which is a Japanese version of Patagonia, Paddy Palin etc, and even I couldn’t resist buying some shirts (walking shirts!) and a jacket, and later after the last shrine we were chatting and saying we should look for a knife shop in Kyoto, when right in front of us up popped a most excellent knife shop. We went in and all bought knives. Ours is a small paring knife, 17 layered steel and engraved with Rosie in kanji! The shop is owned by a family who have been making knives for 750 years (and samurai swords)...so what a happy find!Lue lisää