Goodbye Tokyo, Hello Kyoto

Today is our transit day from Tokyo to Kyoto. We’re a bit sad to be leaving Tokyo but also very excited to be getting out to the city and moving onto our next stop.

We checked out at 9.30am & left our luggage with reception at the hotel as there were just two sites we needed to tick off before leaving - check out Sensoji Temple & head back to Skytree tower as the weather today is much better for viewing.

First stop was Sensoji Temple and it was so beautiful. The bright colours again of this temple are incredible, the amount of people & amount of smoke filling the area from people lighting candles for their prayers inside adds another element to this mind blowing temple. I can see why it’s so popular, we made our way through the temple entrance & hoped to read our fortunes (if you receive

good luck you can keep, it bad luck you tie it on the well outside the temple and rid of the luck bestowed upon you) I would’ve loved to experience that but unfortunately they were all written in Japanese and I’d hate to get it wrong, waking out with a bad fortune...

We did some souvenir shopping on the way out of the cute little town heading over to Skytree tower. We could see the tower from the temple and with it only being a 20 minute walk we decided to make the trek much to the dismay of our feet. We’ve done so much walking this holiday that all of our legs are killing us but we’ll keep soldiering on through.

As the day was getting along we knew we needed to get back to the Grand Nikko hotel for our bags and make the 3hr 45min journey to Kyoto and although I am really dreading having to cart our luggage through the trains to Tokyo Centre I am really looking forward to being on our first bullet train, eek!

The bullet train was lovely, they are so clean & we are able to

reserve seats on them which is a nice touch. Our only concern was our luggage, where do they go and how on earth do we store them. Once we got on the Shinkansen we realised they needed to go up above our seats, thankfully Pete was with us and was able to lift ours above our heads. Especially mine, it weights an absolute ton I’m not sure how on earth he was able to lift it but I am grateful he did.

Eventually we arrived in Kyoto, the Shinkansens travel so fast and whilst you’re on them it doesn’t feel like it. Their actually a really smooth ride which is nice. Kyoto is freezing but thankfully we booked accommodation right across from the station so it’s super easy to get too. Once we checked in & were given our room up on one of the high floors we made our way up to our room....

The room was sooo tiny, like ridiculously tiny. Bathroom, we could barely move in & the beds well you may as well have been sleeping on a giant double bed with 4 walls either side - ain’t no one moving around them. It was pretty bad, enough so that we had been in the room all of 2 minutes before saying nup we’re upgrading or leaving. Thankfully after speaking with the manager about our room and not realizing how tiny it would be he was able to upgrade us to an alternate room for a discounted price than what is on the website - he took me up to show me the room & let’s just say it’s totally worth the extra money.

The Garden Zen suite it’s called and it is beautiful, as if we were staying in Bali again. We have a lit up (private) outdoor garden area that can seen from inside our room, a 3 way bathroom with tons of space (including a his and hers sink) & a couch for us to chill out on. These rooms are currently set up for 2 people but tomorrow they will bring up a third bed (which there is more than enough room for) so tonight mums on the couch (I offered but she snores so corner for her it is, lol)

We made our way across the road to find a funky little Japanese pasta restaurant. There seems to be many more food options here which is great, we do like our food! The pasta was amazing & again the food was out to us within 15 minutes, love it.

Tomorrow is a bit of an easier day for us, we’ve got plans but nothing too crazy & not completely go-go-go all day which will be a nice change of pace for us.