We checked out early from the hotel in Osaka, and we weren't sad to leave. After a chaotic scene at the front desk we were out of there, and went for breakfast down the road. The cafe owners were not impressed by our big bags but we managed to squeeze them in anyway. We headed for the JR station, and took a train to Osaka, then changed for a train to Kyoto. An hour later, we were in Kyoto main station, found a tourist information place, got a map, and took a subway ride to the nearest station to our ryokan (a traditional Japanese inn - this one was a house made of wood). It was all remarkably easy.

The ryokan was amazing! We were quite far away from the centre of Kyoto; the surroundings were peaceful and green . The ryokan had traditional tatami flooring, a beautiful garden, and friendly owners who were well organised, with tourist information at hand. The room was gorgeous, soft colours, wood fixings, a low table and low beds. It couldn't have been more different from the previous tiny smelly room that was our hotel in Osaka. We sat and drank tea for a while, and soaked up our surroundings. We decided to have a lazy day and did things like have a nap, drink some more tea, do a little planning, and content ourselves with relaxing for a while. In the evening, we figured out the bus system - a city bus system that's logical! - and headed into the city for a very nice dinner. Lovely.

On Saturday 3rd, we took a bus to Kyoto station in order to get a JR train a couple of stops south. Unfortunately the bus took an hour. That's when we realised we could get around the city easily and pretty cheaply, but not quickly. Eventually we made it to our first destination, Fushimi-Inari Shrine . This is a famous shrine in Kyoto, and very popular. In addition to the shrine, it also has walkways, which are covered in gates. It was picturesque, but hasslesome with the crowds. By this time, snacks for breakfast had long worn off, so we headed back to Kyoto main station to get some food.

First, we went up to the top of the train station to get a view around Kyoto. The windows were darkened and we couldn't see east, but otherwise it was pretty nice to take a look. We walked to a vegetarian place nearby, but unfortunately at that time it was only serving drinks and not food. So we took a bus to the Ponto-cho area, and looked for another vegetarian place. We couldn't find it. We grabbed a snack from a Lawsons to tide us over, and walked down Ponto-cho. This is a atmospheric little street in the Gion district, full of eateries, tea houses, bars and Geishas, apparently. We found a vegan burger place and chowed down at last, before heading to the Gion corner to see if we could catch a show.

We knew that there were Geisha shows on, but could find no information about where, when or how to buy tickets. So we took a walk to a theatre, spoke to some rude people, and wound up joining a queue. We were in luck. After waiting for nearly an hour, we went into a show which was a little over an hour long, and featured a tea ceremony, Japanese harp being played, flower arranging, gagaku (court music and dance), kyogen (ancient comic play), kyomai (Kyoto style dance), and Bunraku (puppet play) . We also blagged front row seats, despite a rude German man who tried to take ours (because he was going to film the performance). The first part of the show included the tea ceremony, harp and flower arranging happening all at the same time, in different parts of the room. Not sure why it was done like this, as we couldn't take in the details of everything. The gagaku involved a man in costume dancing, as well as music being played. The kyogen storyline was two servants stealing their masters sake, despite being tied up. The final act was the Bunraku, which was a puppet play featuring only the woman of a love duo. We had a leaflet to explain the play, but it and the performance made little sense. The highlight of the show was the penultimate act; the kyomai. This was two dances, performed by either a Geisha, or a Maiko (a trainee Geisha). We don't know which she was, but either way the performance was spectacular. The dances were full of intricacies and were beautifully performed.

After the performance, we took a bus to a falafel place, before heading back to the ryokan .

On Sunday 4th, we headed to the Arashiyama area in the north west of Kyoto. To get there, we had to take two buses, which took an hour and a half. By this time, breakfast had worn off, and learning the lessons from the previous day, we got lunch as soon as possible from a delicious vegan restaurant. Feeling full, we headed to the Tenryu temple. There were two costs to get into the place, one for the temple and one for the gardens. We opted for the gardens only and had a lovely 40 minutes strolling through the area, with it's trees, lakes, streams, bamboo, shrines and autumnal feel.

We exited through the north entrance, and went to the bamboo grove. This was a walk through a bamboo forest, overhanging a road. It was a bit contained for our liking; we wanted to go wandering off into the forest itself. This wasn't possible unfortunately, so we contented ourselves with the tall bamboo on the walk. At the top end of the bamboo grove, there was a house with apparent nice views over the area . This was costly to get into so we opted against it. Instead, we walked across a nearby river to the Iwatayama Monkey Park. This was a '20 minute' fairly steep uphill walk (it took us 12 minutes) to the top of a hill, where monkeys get fed. Because they get fed, they hang out for tourists to go and see them, and are quite fearless of people. We saw loads of monkeys, including several baby monkeys, and they were simply hanging around. In trees, by a pond, on the roof of a building, on the grass, in the middle of the path, everywhere. There were a couple of displays of aggression that we witnessed. Monkeys would occasionally walk past us, so close that they were brushing against our jeans. There was a building where people went in and bought food, to feed the monkeys. They could only feed the monkeys through the bars inside the building, to prevent any attacks or aggression on people for having food. It was amusing to watch the monkeys take their preferred apple over peanuts, and eating the flesh but not the skin of the apple . The place also had a nice view down over the whole of Kyoto city, which was shining in the sun. It was a nice place, but unfortunately felt artificial.

After leaving the monkey park, we wanted to go to a nearby temple, but wouldn't make it there before the temple shut. Instead, we opted to walk alongside the Katsura river for a while. This was just lovely, in the late afternoon sun, getting some fresh air and wonderful views up and down the river. With the leaves of the trees just starting to turn, the view was beautiful.

After a walk to the train station, we took a JR train one stop, and a bus from there to our ryokan. This was much quicker than the buses we'd taken in the morning! We whiled the evening away catching up on necessities, like planning for the next stop, and drinking beer on the tatami.

On Monday 5th, we headed to the historical Higashiyama district of Kyoto for a day of temple sightseeing . We started in the north, and on the Path of Philosophy - a cherry-tree canal following path, named because of philosopher Nishida Kitaro's daily meditation on the path. We quickly departed from the path to go to Ginkaku-ji temple, otherwise known as the silver pavilion. This was a beautiful set of gardens, complete with moss, flowing water, carp, gnarled trees, autumnal colours, shrines, gates, small uphill walks and lovely views. It was a stunning setting. After having our fill, we headed back on the Path of Philosophy to Honen-in temple. This was much quieter, with paintings on display of Europe and Christianity, which was a little odd, as were the people having their lunch in the same room. It wasn't even lunch time. The carp in the pond were leaping about, which was also odd. As the temple was set behind a hill, the place was dark and a little mysterious. We didn't stay for long.

Back on the Path of Philosophy, we walked to the end, bought coffee, and walked on the road a little way to Nanzen-ji temple. We would have to pay to go up into the San-mon (temple gate) or go into the gardens - and we felt like we'd done enough going up things and paying for gardens for a while. So instead, we walked under a red-brick aqueduct, and up a wooded hill to Oku-no-in temple and waterfall. This was delightfully quiet, and we clambered around the waterfall for a while. The waterfall reminded us of St Nectan's Glen near Tintagel in Cornwall, though it was much more contrived than the natural setting of St Nectan's . At the top of the waterfall, suddenly the woods looked just like Luxulyan woods, near home in Cornwall. The similarity of a first glance was striking. We admired the shrines there, including one in a small cave, before heading back down and walking further south, to get to South Higashiyama district.

Next, we went to Shoren-in temple. We paid for admittance, removed our shoes and sat in an open sided building for a while, looking at the pond in the garden. This was primarily to rest our weary feet but the view was very pretty too. The temple was a series of interconnected rooms, complete with tatami mats and painted walls. After recovering, we walked around it, before collecting our shoes and heading into the gardens. As was becoming standard with the temple gardens, the moss, ponds, shrines, carp, hillside walk, granite, ambience and slowly winding paths were very peaceful and lovely.

Having had our fill of Shoren-in, we tried to go to Chion-in temple, but sadly it shut to new visitors just as we arrived . We passed the San-mon temple gate, which is the biggest in Japan, and headed instead into Maruyama Park. We'd intended to walk around the park for a little while, but instead sat and listened to a man play a flute, and rescued two tiny fish after three boys had pulled them out of the pond and accidentally spilled them onto the floor. Instead, we went to Yasaka Shrine; the shrine to Gion (famous for Geishas) district. This was full of people and full of shrines, with lots of colour and donging of bells.

Our final sightseeing destination of the day was Ishibei-koji street, a street famous for being the supposedly prettiest in Japan. It was small, winding, and pretty, but not spectacular.

We took a bus back to the vegan burger place again, and had things other than burgers. Here we met a lady called Sarah who offered us help with anything we might possibly need in Japan, and gave us useful information on kanji and some vegetarian off-the-shelf products available in any of the little convenience stores we frequent, a lot . The streets and buses were packed, so we headed into H&M and actually managed to purchase two t-shirts for Jayna (over time we'd been to about 30 shops looking for t-shirts - apparently she's picky). We took a bus back to our ryokan, found a liquor store for some cheap booze and enjoyed the remainder of the evening in the ever-calming environs.

On Tuesday 6th, we took a bus to see if we could buy a ticket to a Geisha show. We couldn't, as the Gion Corner was closed. We thought we would go back if we had time, but considered this unlikely. So we took another bus to nearby Nijo-jo Castle, surrounded by a moat and defensive walls. We paid our entrance fee, and walked in through the impressive Kara-Mon gate, before removing our shoes to go into Ninomaru Palace. Completed in 1603, the castle is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. There were no photos allowed inside the many rooms, which were filled with tatami mats and elaborate wall designs. The walls were fantastic, despite being fakes. The real paintings were being restored or were under display in a museum. We wandered around the hallways with the nightingale flooring - floors designed to make a chirping noise when walked on, as a security device (ie. to alert for intruders).

Shoes donned again, we headed into the Ninomaru Garden. This was a peaceful spot, complete with pond and islands, and a heron flying around . Next was the outside of the Honmaru Palace, surrounded by another moat and defensive walls. We climbed the donjon for a better look around the surroundings, and headed out, past another set of gardens called Seiryu-en. We'd spent a good two hours wandering around, so it was time for lunch in a nearby vegetarian cafe. Two large blocks away, the lunch was delicious and the people were so friendly.

We then took a bus to the Kyoto Manga Museum. We were expecting a gallery, but this was more like a library than a museum. There were thousands of examples of manga available to read. We picked up a couple and browsed for a while, before heading for a look around the rest of the museum. We saw 100 manga works of art depicting Maikos, all of which were utterly unique. We saw some large scale prints and reproductions of images onto things like umbrellas. Mostly, we saw people reading. It was very popular and there were people sat everywhere, engrossed in the material. After a little more than an hour, we decided to go to the Imperial Palace Gardens for a sit down. Unfortunately, it got cold when we arrived, and we were not prepared with jackets. After sitting for a few minutes, we decided to head back to the ryokan for a quiet evening in, complete with junk food. Awesome.

On Wednesday 7th, we checked out and decided to go to one final temple. Possibly the most famous of all of those in Kyoto, we headed to Kinkaku-ji temple, otherwise known as the Golden Pavilion. A 15 minute bus ride away, we were joined by crowds and crowds of people. This included many school children, some of whom who waved at us and said hello. The temple is called the Golden Pavilion because of it's extensive covering of gold leaf. Like many of the temples we'd visited, the gardens were gorgeous and we rued that we couldn't have visited a few weeks later for the glorious autumnal colours. We didn't stay for long because the crowds were oppressive, and drifted our way out to the exit. We headed back to the ryokan, collected our bags, and headed to Kyoto main station for a bullet train to our next stop - Hiroshima!