Friday 30th We actually made the bus 5 minutes early which kind of annoyed us more as we were just wanting to get on the bus at this point. I've (hayley) never weezed before when running but coz of the backpack it was not easy. Ended up chatting to two girls from London who were teaching there. I recognised one girl and it only turned out that she grew up in Enfield, London and went to the same drama school (bodens) as me! talk about a small world. We also met a guy (ben) from NY on the bus, who had no hostel booked and was gonna join our search party on arrival! We both slept on and off and woke up in desperate need of a shower. To put it lightly we stank! The first hostel we came to had no room at the inn, but we found a list of hostels and numbers. The first one i rang had a japanese man who spoke a little english, he kept on shouting down the phone 'come to my hotel', when at first he said he had no room. We chanced this anyway and ended up staying in a traditional ryokan which was not actually the hostel itself but his 'hotel'. it was pretty quaint actually and we managed to do our washing and drying for free and had free use of the internet! bonus! In a ryokan you are not allowed to wear your shoes we were already used to leaving our shoes outside, but here we got some green slippers, they were funny! The owner was actually very hospitable and reminded us of the guy who trained the karate kid in the film. Went back to kyoto station to the tourist information and found out about local theatre, and the like. Here we had our first sit down meal of the journey with ben. We had italian! After this we were really tired and slept again at wierd times (3-8pm). I was really angry when we woke up as we only intended to sleep for an hour or so, as we were going to go to a traditional show! Instead, Us two and Ben (yes he became our new friend) took the bus to Kiyomizu temple, it was beautifully lit in the evening because of the blossom season and they had some lovely shops hidden down windy cobbled roads. I bought an umbrella which I had wanted since Tokyo and ed said he would pick up some chopsticks before we left! Me and ed decided to walk back instead of taking the bus, ben went around the temple.It was a nice walk back if not slightly cold, but we were beginning to relax and enjoy japan, finally. Saturday 31st. the ryokan was really comfortable, but we couldnt stay there for long as we had our last day in japan ahead of us, and wanted to make the most of it. bought breakfast in a bakery- really good pastries-but the lady didnt like us!! went to the station to pick up all day bus ticket and book train for the evening trip to osaka airport. at the station hayley got really excited when we saw some Geisha ladies, as she didnt think she would see any. much to her pleasure she got her photo with one of them. today we went to the Golden Pavilion, Nijo Castle and The Imperial Palace. in the evening we went to Gion Corner to see the traditional show. at the Golden Pavilion we did our fortunes and tied them to the rope on exiting the grounds, as this is tradition. i broke mine!!! and it said i would have a bad misfortune but get over it. so i did and went to Nijo castle. here the floors were designed to warn the guards of any trespassers by sounding like nightingales (v.cool old technology). went round the gardens and walked to Imperial Palace- long walk. and we couldnt get in. so again we walked round the gardens. went back and put our bags in the lockers at the station, squeezed both into the same locker, anything to save 600 yen (3pounds). went to get some food then embarked on the now infamous walk to Gion Corner. it involved running again, as everthing does here, and making it just on time again. we watched a variety of performances (tea ceremony, flower arrangement with japanese harps (koto), wierd traditional music and dance (gagaku), kyomai dance with 2 geisha ladies, a comic play called kyogen and ending with a puppet play called bunraku, hayley enjoyed it, i was slightly confused and scared by some of it. walked back to the station and travelled to the airport, ending our journey in japan, just to top it off a lady pushed me out the way, so hayley stuck her bag right in front of her on the train. got to airport at 11pm, and slept in the hotel sleeping area, but got moved by some guards and told to find somewhere else to sleep. hopefully i wont get soaked with cranberry juice (which was dripping from the overhead compartment) on this flight!!!!