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Well today was the highlight of our trip. We are so very tired tonight but very happy. Today was the day we met with our volunteer guide from the Good Samaratan club in Kyoto. This is a group of university students who guide foreigners around the city of Kyoto. Today we had a lovely fellow named Hideaki who brought along a trainee, Ryo. When you have a volunteer guide you must pay for the bus fares and lunch but no other payments are made.
So the boys met us at our Ryokan at 9am. They gave us some one day passes for use on the Kyoto bus system and then we were off to our first stop. We travelled by bus to Nijo castle. This castle was built in 1603 as the official Kyoto residence of the first Shogun. It really gave an insight into life during those times. An interesting feature of the castle were the floorboards. They squeaked like a bird when you walked on them. This was a security feature of the time so their enemies could not sneak up on them.
Today was so hot in Kyoto. The sun was shining it was a beautiful but
very humid day. We sat and had a cold drink and got to know the boys better. Both go to different universities but are studying english of course.
Next up was another ride on the bus to Shijo-kyomachiya, which is a traditional japanese house on display to the public. The house was built in 1910 and again gave an excellent insight into life during that time. We spent some time sitting in an upstairs room talking with our guides, sharing information about our own homes and the cultural differences in our lives. I cannot tell you enough how much we enjoyed this time.
By now we were ready for lunch. In advance I had arranged for Hideaki to take us to a restaurant that served okonomiyaki, which is loosely a pancake with cabbage, noodles, pork, squid and topped with a lovely bbq and mayonnaise sauce. We thoroughly enjoyed tasting this food. Even me who usually gives pork a miss. There is a hotplate grill built into the table and the food is partially good and served from there. It was another wonderful experience. One of the best we have had. Hideaki showed Rebecca some oragami as we waited
for our meal, and together they made a crane.
After lunch it was back on the bus to travel to Kiyomizu temple which is on the side of a hill. This temple is at the top of a steep street that has shops selling food and souvenirs on the way up (and later down). This temple was built in 798 but burned down and was rebuilt in 1633. It was in the most pituresque setting and we enjoyed hearing the story of the temple. Bec and I pullled our fortunes and I got quite a good one and Bec's was only so-so.
The next stop was reached by travelling on train to Fushimi-inari shrine. This shrine is dedicated to the gods of rice and is guarded by stone foxes, considered to be a messenger of the rice god. The interesting thing was there are hundreds of torii gates lining a pathway up the mountain. By now our feet were throbbing and we could only manage a few metres into the pathway before turning around again. I was happy to have seen them as they are used in the movie - Memoirs of a geisha - one of my
favourite movies.
Hideaki and Ryo saw us safely back to our ryokan and we made our goodbyes. We had been out for over 8 hours and we had a fantastic time. Hideaki had found me a restaurant close by that served yakitori but we found ourselves too tired to walk the short distance. Instead we headed around the corner from our ryokan for a meal of steak and grilled hamburger. We were the only foreigners in the place and the meal was great.
We will sleep so well tonight. We had the best time today and feel like we have made some new friends.
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