Konnichiwa :) Today we have gotten a lot done, so we both feel really good. The day started with a trip to the Golden Temple, the burning down of which was the subject of Mishima's novel 'The Temple of the Golden Pavillion'. The top two floors (of three) are coated entirely in golden leaf, and there is a golden Chinese pheonix on the top. The whole thing is surrounded by a lake and trees, and it looks amazing. We then moved on to Nijo-castle and its grounds, wh...

Ohayou! (apparently I've been spelling it wrong, whoops) Today Joe and I have gotten a lot done in the lovely sunshine of Kyoto. Completely different from yesterday, we had zero percent chance of rain all day! Let me say that again; ZERO chance. So we went up Kyoto tower, which is around 100m high, and had a look out over the city. There were binoculars and so Joe and I had lots of fun following cars and people and looking at temples in the distance. We found o...

Konnichiwa! Wow. Today has been full of ups and downs like no other. We've finally done some washing (!) so all of our clothes are clean, which was a bonus. After finishing that gruelling work, we headed to a Kyoto food market which promised wide varieties of the crazier side of food. It was great there! So much great smelling tasties - I plumped for cheese wrapped in a fat chicken breast, which was delicious, a banana (!!) and some chocolate (only my second pi...

Ohio from Kyoto! So, Joe and I have now left Tokyo. We took the shikansen (bullet train) for three and a half hours to Kyoto, where we checked into Asia's No. 2 hostel (bested only by its partner in Tokyo). On the journey, we passed through the station Shinfuji - and a few moments later we were watching Mt. Fuji pass us by, shrouded in clouds but still looking majestic! Kyoto's really nice, though we've not spent much time here yet since we dropped our bags off...