Kyoto 2008
Though I stayed in Kyoto for a couple of nights I only spent three quarters of a day in Kyoto itself. Here are some photos from that day.
Close to shijyou there is a famous market which is just full of all sorts of weird and wonderful Japanese foods, particularly seafood. In order of food, the photos include: an osembei shop, squid, octopus, bamboo root, real wasabi and tako-yaki.
Walking along the back streets of Kyoto is a rewarding experience. At the end of the market there is an area of more modern shops but five minutes away there are at least a dozen small shrines/temples along small streets which appear to double as normal houses.
My favourite site was of a shrine which was built into a block of flats! (photo 13). Not far from there I was walking along a charming local road only to come across a building named 'Puyo' which charged services by the hour... what an interesting mixture of culture all within a five minute walk.
A short ride from Kyoto station is Fushimi Inari-taisha, a shrine with thousands of red torii lined up along the paths around the shrine complex. I'd wanted to visit this shrine for years and the rain did little to spoil the trip. To walk around the entire shrine you have to walk up into the mountain and according to a map the full round trip takes over two hours - next time!
I've been to Kyoto quite a few times now but there is always something new to see.



