Today I got up at 5am to get 2 trains then a Shinkansen (Bullet Train) to Kyoto with Asaki. I met her after getting the first train with Eriko who was nice enough to take me to MAchida very early in the morning for both me and her. Her Dad was also really kind and drove us to Komae station. It was seriously unbelievable how many people there still were on the train, basically all the seats on our carriage were taken.

I got the Shinkansen with Asaki at Shin-Yokohama at about 7am. It was my first time on a Shinkansen so I really was looking forward to seeing what it was like but I was too tired to really appreciate it fully. But it was still amazing, it goes so fast that to turn they have to bank the corners so it doesn't come off the rails, also once it gets going you can get the whole ear pressure popping affect as well. There was a lot of great scenery out the window but everytime i saw something I wanted to take a photo of either a tree, a building or a tunnel would suddenly get in the way.

Once we got there we tried to check in to the hotel but we were to early so we just decided to go and have a look a few temples before going back. All of them were really nice, but my favourite was the Kinkakuji (gold temple, see photo). I'd seen it tourism ads for Japan before so it was really cool to see it up close. By that stage of the day I'd used Eriko's dad's camera a lot and so the battery died half way through, but I still got a few good photos. Also at one of the temples there were things that you could touch your phone to and then your phone would tell you all about the thing you were standing in front of. I think it only worked for japanese phones though. What I loved about it though, was that it was just a little wooden box, i guess to blend in more.

We went to one at night as well, when there were very few people around which was really cool, it felt very serene. It was quite a long day in the end but it was good overall.