Tokyo

We did not see much of Tokyo last week as Oskar was sick and we were exhausted. This time we had two half-days until our flight back.
After a smooth train ride back from Kyoto with a glimpse at Mount Fuji (yeah!), we arrived back where we started, the Hilton in Shinjuku. We dropped everything and went to the imperial gardens for a little walk.  Nothing really impressive about those gardens.

Had we started with those, we would have been impressed but after seeing Kyoto those were only a pale comparison.

It did feel a bit like Central Park with the gardens in the middle of buildings.

That's pretty much all we did that day. Later on we had dinner in a Japanese BBQ near the hotel. Meet was amazing (even fully cooked). It was stressful to watch constantly Oskar to make sure he would stay away from the fire. At the same time it was nice to have once again dinner altogether, especially when someone else will clean up all the rice Oskar nicely spread on the floor :)

Looking for the right exit?

Here is a map of the station. I challenge you to find the right one.

Coucou!

Where is Oskar?

Coucou!

Last day in Kyoto

We started the day with the Fushimi-Inari-Taisha Shrine and we were clearly not prepared.

The shrine is basically a path that takes you up the hill and back down.

Easy you may say.
Except the path was basically one giant staircase and we had not packed the baby carrier, only the stroller. Stubborn as we are, we powered through until the top: me carrying Oskar and Wolfram everything else (yes, the stroller, the diaper bag, the camera bag...). And then all the way down.

While the effort was much more than we expected, the place was really worth it. Especially towards the top as fewer and fewer people would reach it. It's simply unbelievable the atmosphere they managed to create. Nearly making you forget the pain you are in.

After our little climbing experience, we decided to keep it easy for the rest of the day and only visited one more temple: Kiyomizu-dera it was.

A small temple located on a hill with ramps everywhere so we could easily push Oskar around. A temple like we like them.

We walked back to the hotel through some old parts of Kyoto. This was more what I had in mind about Kyoto vs. the modern part of the city. It was a perfect way to finish our visit of Kyoto, on a peaceful note.

For dinner, we ventured in one of the local restaurant near the hotel. One of those were they cook at the counter and you eat as the food is being prepared. We ordered different dishes: Japanese pizza (which I like very much), Japanese pancake (which had too much green onion for my taste), some scallops and fried noodles just to make sure we would have enough in case any of them did not taste good. Food was very good, ambiance unique, the chef and his wife very attentive to us and Oskar. A true Japanese experience!

Nara

Nara was the first capital of Japan (before it moved to Kyoto). It still holds several sites which we visited today. The nice thing about Nara is that everything can be done by foot. the key sites are located in the Nara park or around it.
We walked from the station to the park and met the deer almost immediately. Apart from the sites, Nara is famous for all the deer that are living freely in the park. They are everywhere. They look filthy. They are like the pigeons in Jardin du Luxembourg or the squirrels in Yosemite. While it's nice to see them and Oskar enjoyed it a lot, our challenge was to ensure that none would touch him.

First stop was Todai-ji temple. The first gate to the temple is massive.

 The temple itself is huge as it holds a 50m-high Buddha. We've seen a lot of Buddhas over the years in China and Thailand but this one is really big. Even Oskar noticed it.

 A "little" Buddha on the side.

 The big Buddha.

We lit a candle for the whole family. By then, Oskar had figured out that in every temple there are candles and was eagerly pointing at my bag to get coins for the candles.

To encourage donation, the temple offers to buy a tile, to write a message on it and later it will be placed on the roof. We got one for Oskar so even if he does not remember his trip to Japan, Todai-ji temple will have a mark of his visit. Wolfram took up th challenge to write with the brush.

After Oskar's lunch and some quality time with the deer, we visited the Kasuga-Taisha shrine. Oskar was so focused on the gravel that I am not sure he noticed the place where he was.

The shrine buildings themselves were not exceptional, what was great were all the pathways around bordered by lanterns.

There was a whole forest of these lanterns. I could imagine how it would look like at night when they light up. It felt like being in one of Miyazaki's cartoon movies. I could see where he it his imagination. 

 

On the way back, we stopped at Kyoto station for our lunch/dinner combo. We ate some pork cutlet and shrimp tempura set meal (i.e. with miso soup, Japanese pickles and lot's of rice). Once Oskar woke up from his nap, he greedily ate some rice from my bowl. Japanese rice is very sticky so the poor little guy did not know what to do with the grains stuck on his hands. As you can imagine, many (many many) ended up on my t-shirt.