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Gion Geishas
En route to KodaijiI had some time on my hands, so I decided to wrap this business up right quick. Here, therefore, is the last installment of the Kyoto trip! Enjoy!
March 29, Saturday It was back to Gion this day with Kodai-ji Temple as our first stop after lunch. This place also had a giant Buddha, made of stone. The surrounding scenery was much better, though. I made sure to get lots of shots. Then we walked through the streets of Gion and got some interesting ice cream at a restaurant. Liz had some soft serve. Lauren and Aimee had some sakura ice cream, and I had a really wonderful bowl of crazy that included soybean ice cream (kinda like peanut butter, but not as strong and more awesome), vanilla ice cream, sweet red beans, balls of mochi, warabimochi (which is a little like gelatin, coated in soybean flour), and corn flakes. It was pretty amazing. Like… Eating Autumn. We went back to Kiyomizu-dera Temple and paid to get further in. More pictures were taken. You know the drill. We had ice cream again at a soft serve place when we got out. I had a wonderful twist on a swirl
Kodaiji
The feature statue.. cone. Instead of vanilla and chocolate, I had green tea and sakura! I really wish we had sakura ice cream back in the states. It’s so good! And it really is like tasting a sweet flower. Never had anything like it before. We had udon for dinner at the same restaurant as before, and Liz and Aimee and I even bought yukatas (summer kimonos) for ourselves. The shop was selling a set -yukata, obi (the belt that goes around), a bag, and shoes, all for 4,000 yen! We also all bought swanky fans at a different shop. When we got home, we tried on all our yukatas for Hideko-san and had a grand old time. Hideko even gave Lauren one of her old yukatas and gave us all furoshiki (Japanese square of cloth that they use to wrap bentos and gifts)! The one I got was absolutely beautiful! We were so overwhelmed!
March 30, Sunday Our last night in Kyoto was so cold that Aimee and I actually ended up sleeping downstairs on the heated living room floor. We all got up a little late, and Hideko was wonderful and made us all a great breakfast again. We
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Another blossomed sakura tree! went to Kyoto Station and back down to Porta, where we had a very light lunch and some great parfaits that Lauren had her eye on for days. After that, we went home and took it easy. We packed all our stuff up and took some time to relax. After that, we went for dinner with Hideko. We had all talked the night before, and she had said she wanted to take us out somewhere nice before we left. She asked if there was anything in particular we wanted to eat. I piped up and said shabu-shabu, since I’d never had it before. Shabu-shabu is an amazing Japanese variation on the hot pot. You get to cook for yourself plates of thinly sliced meat (usually beef) and veggies in pots of lightly flavored broth. So Hideko took us, along with Keiko and her husband, to a mall a ways away from her house into a really nice restaurant where she had actually made reservations! The food was fantastic, and it was a really wonderful way to end the trip.
After dinner, we gathered our things and headed to the station. Hideko and Keiko followed through the ticket stiles to
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A busy bee in the blossoms the trains and waved us off until we were out of sight! Such a kind and wonderful family! We were actually kinda sad to leave them. But it had to come to an end some time, and as nice as it was, we were all missing our rooms back home. It was an amazing trip, and one that I won’t soon forget!
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