It's our final morning in Kyoto and we're off to catch the Shinkansen to Hiroshima in about an hour. Had a manic final day here yesterday, squeezing in lots of sightseeing to make up for our general slackness the day before. The first stop was Nijo-jo (the castle). It comprised of two internal palaces, walls, a moat and landscaped gardens. We paid to walk through one of the palaces and it had nightingale floors which had been fashioned so that the floor boards m...

Konbanwa! It's 10pm here in Kyoto and we're relaxing in the hostel with dubious looking cloudy saki and beer from the vending machine... Had a pretty relaxing day today after the mayhem of yesterday. We hired bikes and cycled around Southeast Kyoto, stumbling upon an amazing Zen temple called Tofuku-ji. After looking around there we set back off for our original destination, Fushimi-Inari Taisha. It's a shrine with hundreds of vivid red torii (they look a bit ...

Enjoy life, enjoy your sock style: the best sign we've seen so far in Kyoto and valuable advice, I'm sure you'll agree. Yesterday was our first full day in Kyoto and it was a really good one. We took it a bit easier on ourselves and yet still managed to cram in viewing some famous sights. We started the day with a trip to see Ginkaku-ji (translated literally as 'silver pavilion'). Unfortunately it was undergoing rennovation, as Don put it 'it's a serene building...

Greetings from Kyoto! We arrived at around 3pm after a 2.5 hour ride on the Shinkansen. Apparently they can reach speeds up to 300km/h but I'm not sure that we were going that fast. There's a lot of leg room though and stepford wives-esque cleaners in identical pink uniforms. Plus we were in the smoking carriage (unlucky Jim!) which kept me and Don happy! Our hostel here is substantially nicer than the one in Tokyo and a lot more traditional (can't wear shoes in...