Day 10 - Shiga Kogen to Kyoto

Day 10 - Shiga Kogen to Kyoto

We awoke and got ready to catch the 7am local bus down from Shiga Kogen, is was a blue sky morning after a snowy night. It was very cold waiting for the bus. The bus took the local route down through the ski fields and onto Yudanaka (1,100yen). From here this dropped us at Yudanaka station where we had to purchase tickets to Nagano for the 8:10 train. (Note no JR pass or suica is taken here, 1260yen).

The local train stopped all stations and we had to change trains at Shinshunakano, it was just across platform and then ride the 18 stops to Nagano. Here we hit up the New Days to stock up on breakfast and snacks for our next 2 train journeys. We boarded the 10am Kagayaki for Kanazawa, arriving at 11:05am.

From here we boarded the Thunderbird bound for Kyoto, arriving at 1:37pm. Our hotel is just on the south side of the stationMimaru Kyoto station, so we dropped our bags and headed back across the road to ride the subway to Kyoto city area. Our first port of call was the Pokemon centre where the kids found lots they loved, purchases made. Then we walked through Nishiki Market as I had heard about an amine store with cheap prices nearby. We found it Melonbooks, and Dale had a ball buying up things she loved so cheap. Most of the figures she got were only 440 yen for 10-15cm high figure.

Then it was a walk through the gion district, stopping for Taiyaki. Then we co tinues to see the Hokan-ji temple pagoda and walk around the Sanneizaka area and up to Kiyomizu-dera at sunset. From here it was a 30min walk to the train station or a 35min walk back to the hotel, so we walked the 4km back to the hotel arriving at 6pm. The room is very nice with bunks for the kids.

Coco Ichibanya was for dinner and luckily there was one 350m away from the hotel. After a curry fill we went back to the station and caught the train 2 stops to Inari, and walked through the main parts at night. It is very beautiful at night. A short train ride back to the hotel to call it a night.Read more