12 hours on japan airlines, and i gotta say these kids were troopers. it was actually one of our best flights ever, both ways!
we opted for 2 umbrella strollers for this trip... japan's public transit is not setup for full sized american strollers, let alone a double stroller.
if you want to buy a japan rail (jr) pass, you need to buy it in the states, before you get to japan. we bought ours at a travel agency in little tokyo. jr trains are long distance trains, similar to our metrolink and amtrak trains. we bought a 1 week pass, and in that week we used it to get from narita airport to kyoto, kyoto to osaka, kyoto to nara, and kyoto to tokyo, so it more than paid for itself. every major station has a jr reservation desk, and there is even a special (and shorter) line for foreigners that has english speaking employees that help figure out where you want to go, which trains to take, reserve your seats, and tell you which track to go on and what time to be there... which was REALLY helpful because there are so many rules on which trains accept jr passes. directions to the tracks also helped a lot... the major stations are HUGE and CONFUSING!
the high speed shinkansen trains are nice, clean, and comfortable, and got us from narita airport to kyoto station in about 2.5 hours.
the subways in japan are pretty confusing, it took us a while to get the hang of it. first of all, the stations are MASSIVE. there are several different train companies that operate in each station, and you cant just enter the station anywhere... often specific trains have specific entrances, and use different ticket machines. jr passes dont work on local subways and buses.
look confusing?
how about this?
YOU NEED INTERNET ACCESS TO GET AROUND! we would have been dead without google maps... it told us exactly what subway lines to take, where to enter the stations, the price, and the times. btw, for internet access, we rented a 4g wifi hotspot from the airport. it wasnt unlimited data, but it was something like 4gig per day so it was more than enough. it runs $10/day. we could have also just used our verizon phones data, verizon has an international data plan that costs $25 per 100mb of data. i dont know for sure if the rented hotspot was cheaper than if we had just used verizons plan since i dont know how much data we actually used... but im guessing the airport hotspot was cheaper.
our first taste of japanese subway trains
aiden enjoying his view on the subway
interesting, im sure theres a reason for this?
the subways, with the help of google maps, actually werent too bad once you get used to it. unfortunately, in kyoto, the subways didnt go to all of the places we needed to go, so we had to take a lot of buses. squeezing on and off these things with strollers and other misc baby stuff was tough. to top it off, the buses didnt use english or western characters, so i had to try my best to match up the japanese characters on my phone to the ones displayed on the buses to figure out where to get off.
what the kids like best about vacation... unlimited ipad access
whenever we were in a rush, 7-11 came in handy for some quick bites to eat
most of the bathrooms were setup nice... with a bidet to wash... and even dry your behind. lots had a place to secure your baby when you did your business
and then....... there were these. japanese style squat toilets. i had to help aiden take a dump in these more than once! i had to squat next to him and hold him up by his armpits while he SLOWLY did his thing. my arms were trembling as i tried desperately not to drop him IN THE TOILET! you killlin me with these japan!
to top it off, in kyoto we found that most bathrooms just had a sink. no soap, no paper towels... just a sink with water?
time to explore kyoto! one of the first things we noticed... was there were vending machines... EVERYWHERE. like every 20 feet you walk.
we thought it was strange, but it actually turned out to be so convenient. we even tried the coffee... and ill be damned if this bad boy didnt come out HOT! we drank one almost every morning
the japanese got it figured out man... peep this!
kyoto was the former imperial capital of japan, so there is a ton of beautiful historical sites to visit. the first place we went was kiyomizu dera, a buddhist temple in eastern kyoto
it was pretty early for cherry blossoms, but there were some blooming here!
got some snacks and did some souvenir shopping in the streets around kiyomizu dera
stopped by maruyama park, a big attraction for cherry blossom viewing but unfortunately non were blooming when we were there. you can imagine what it would look like with cherry blossoms though!
i got all excited when i saw these girls... i thought they were geisha! nanci burst my bubble when she said she overheard them talking.... IN CHINESE!!! ugh... i shoulda known real geisha dont use SELFIE STICKS!!!
turns out tons of tourists wear kimonos around. these girls were at least speaking japanese... maybe theyre giesha?
people praying at the yasaka shrine just outside the park
later that day we visited the fushimi inari-taisha shrine at the base or inari mountain, it was super cool!
every shrine has a place for visitors to wash their hands
this pathway is lined with tons of what are called torii. each torii is donated by a japanese business. it takes 2 hours to walk the entire path up the mountain to the inner shrine. we didnt make it that far!
food tasting in the streets outside the shrine
we had ice cream almost every place we saw some for sale man
dinner at the daimaru department store. the department stores in japan have HUGE basement level food markets
our next day in kyoto we headed up to arashiyama, the famous bamboo forest
the kids had fun running around this place
ive titled this photo "fat tourist"
so beautiful!
some snacks outside the forest grounds
of course... ice cream
that afternoon we visited kinkaku-ji, the temple of the golden pavilion. hard to capture this in photos, it was really awesome
panorama of the pavilion
later in the evening we walked through nishiki market, known as the pantry of kyoto. lots of interesting food here that kyoto is famous for
our last day in kyoto we started off visiting ginkaku-ji, the temple of the silver pavilion
our navigator
the temple set in a beautiful garden
ice cream break
walked through the streets outside the temple to the path of philosophy, which is lined with cherry trees that were unfortunately barely starting to blossom
on the way to gion, we passed through a neighborhood in kyoto. it was interesting to see what peoples homes looked like
goin is kyotos most famous geisha district. if we were gonna see real geisha anywhere it would be here! shimbashi dori is one of the prettiest streets in gion, it runs right alongside a river lined with cherry trees... some of which were blossoming
shimbashi dori
and BAM! real geisha!!! it was definitely clear that they were the real thing once you saw them in person. the hair and white makeup, wooden shoes, and the extravagant kimono that i read can cost as much as a car! i read about the rules about respecting geisha when trying to photograph them, so i held my gopgo next to our stroller and inconspicuously snapped a couple quick shots... but man some people were all up in their face with their big cameras!
that does it for kyoto. id highly recommend spending a few days here if you are heading to japan. stay tuned for posts from osaka, nara, and tokyo... as well as a video!
Wow- these are awesome. Joozu ne!
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