Day 9

Today was our first day to really explore Kyoto. It’s definitely smaller and more traditional than Tokyo, and you really notice the amount of tourists here that you never really saw in Tokyo.

We had the hotel’s breakfast buffet, then made our way to our first shrine (Yasaka-jinja Shrine). We explored the park there a little, then decided to go to the famous Fushimi Inari-Taisha. It’s a hike where you walk through hundreds of red gates. I think it took us about an hour to get the top, and we did the hard, off-the-path route that led us up extremely steep stairs in the middle of the forest. We were dying and sweaty haha and I was freaking out the whole time thinking I’d see a snake, so it definitely was not an enjoyable time hahah

There were signs all over to watch out for wild boars and dangerous, aggressive monkeys, so that was also fun haha

After we cooled down, we got another really delicious bowl of ramen, and walked to the main station to pick up tickets we purchased for the Romantic Train Route that we’ll take tomorrow. It started to rain, so it was the perfect excuse to grab at beer at the craft beer hall in the nearby mall and then play arcade games. We ended up going to Hōkan-ji, which is a tall Buddhist temple, but it was already closed. The picture of it lit up from across the street is still pretty, though.

We eventually took the train back to our hotel area, and tried to go to one good sounding restaurant, but it was unfortunately a smoking place. Next door was a fun looking Mexican place (Maximo) so we just went with that (otherwise we’d be walking around forever). And that was the second best choice we made on this trip.

No one thinks to eat Mexican in Japan, but holy shit was it some of the best I’ve ever had. It was a tiny place with seats at the bar, Mexican decor with Buffalo baseball team stuff mixed in. The chef made everything from scratch to order - we watched him mix the tortilla batter, flatten it in his press, and fry it to create homemade chips. And he did that for every dish on the menu. Absolutely crazy.

We have really wanted to go to a baseball game here, but it’s very complicated to get tickets (you need special phone numbers, email addresses, etc) so we asked him the best way to get tickets to his favorite team (who happen to have a home game when we’re in Osaka). He then reserved seats for us using his fan account and discount! And what’s really cool here - you take your confirmation email for tickets, go to 7-11 and pay and print them there for free - it’s such a good system. Ole went, and he had some issues, so the chef ran over to help him. It was so nice of him, and he was a great guy.

Now to end our day with a soak in the bath to relax.

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