Japan trip part three

We had some travel trouble again on our way to Kyoto. There had been an unexpectedly heavy snowfall and the Shinkansen was running at half speed or something, so we had to wait a couple of hours at the station. Normally I wouldn’t have minded this at all, Tokyo station seemed like a fun place to explore! But of course I had woken up that day feeling really nauseous so the trip was a bit of a struggle. Henrik had fun though browsing stationery shops.

When we finally arrived in our lovely Airbnb machiya we got a tour by the host which I did my best to enjoy before running to to the toilet to throw up shortly after she left :P

I definitely recommend staying in a machiya when in Kyoto if you don’t mind some old fashioned things like very steep stairs and going outside to reach the toilet. It wasn’t the most practical place to be sick in, but I still loved it.

Since I wasn’t well we decided to change our Kyoto plans to be more laid back. We had planned to spend one day in Arashiyama, but instead we only did things fairly close to our Airbnb.

On the first full day we took things especially easy and just walked around from temple to temple and through some of the older streets of Kyoto. You can’t throw a rock without hitting a temple or shrine in Kyoto and everything was just gorgeous.

We happened upon another Donguri Republic (the Studio Ghibli shop), and this one had a full size Totoro bus stop photo op! Not the best photo unfortunately, but I was very excited.

There was so much street food around, especially at the temples, that I so wish I could have had, but even just the smell of food made me nauseous. I did eventually manage to share a very nice candy apple with Henrik though.

Met a Tanuki and his massive appendages.

We finally ended up at Kiyomizudera, where we watched a beautiful sunset before heading back to our Airbnb.

Back at the house I tried eating a few bites of cup noodle before having the most wonderful bath of my life.

The very best thing about this house was the outdoor bathtub. Absolutely one of my favourite parts of the entire trip and so nice even, or maybe especially, in the winter cold.

All in all a great day despite feeling under the weather.