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And about a week after my parents left, my sister and cousin came to visit!
April 27th - Kyoto
Georgia and Ali had arrived in Tokyo the night before, and then on the morning of the 27th I took the Shinkansen up to Kyoto while they took it down from Tokyo and we met up on the train platform. We then took a local train out of the city to Ogoto Onsen on the outskirts of Kyoto where we were staying at a ryokan.
Georgia had reserved 2 nights there, so after a walk from the train station we got into our yukata, relaxed a bit, and then went to have kaiseki (the very fancy traditional Japanese meal often served at ryokan). Personally I was much better prepared and accustomed to the food served this time compared to last time, but Georgia and Ali had a much tougher time with all the raw fish, whole mini-squid, and plenty of tofu. I ate some of their sashimi, but even I do not particularly like raw cuttlefish (it's tough but slimy and gluey all at the same time) and our server, upon seeing how much we had left, asked "do you have squid in Canada?". Ah well, we did our best!
The favourite course was "konro", where we had a boiling broth and some fish and veggies to cook in the broth before eating. We were supposed to only dip the fish quickly, but we all let it cook completely to contrast with the raw fish in the other courses. Oh, and the dessert of a pudding and fresh fruit was also a big hit.
The shared (at just our table) tofu, tofu skin, veggie and mushroom soup for breakfast
April 28th - Breakfast
Breakfast was large and featured rice, tofu and mushrooms cooked in a broth, various pickled vegetables, and many many side dishes. Surprisingly, one of my favourites was some beans that had been cooked with a sweet sauce and also had tiny prawns shrimp mixed in. Unfortunately we don't have many good pictures of breakfast, but it was a truly massive amount of food. I don't know how folks can eat that much first thing in the morning. I think I inherited the "go milk the cows and do some chores before breakfast" genes.
All the side dishes, the black lid is the top of a stack of 3 layers, each with different sides
Saikyo-ji temple
We didn't have a plan for the day, and there wasn't a lot to do by our hotel so we went out on a walk to explore and see what there was to see. We started by trying to walk by the water, but it was all fields, fisherman huts, and places to store boats so we couldn't get very close or walk along the water. Then we tried a rose garden, which Google said was open but in actuality wasn't because it is only open a few months of the year, so then we tried walking to a temple and had some success.
It was a hot day and Saikyo-ji temple is at the top of a small mountain (because of course) so we took a few breaks as we walked up. The temple itself is decorated with hundreds of pinwheels which was very cute and provided some nice flashes of bright colour in contrast to all the green gardens and wooden buildings. It was quite a nice place to spend a few hours during the heat of the day. The open doors and thick roof mean that the inside of Buddhist temples tend to be quite cool places, almost chilly with a breeze, even when it is a hot day outside.
Shabu Shabu
For supper we had shabu shabu. At breakfast we had been given the choice of a number of meals for supper. If it had been kaiseki again, we were going to politely ask to cancel, but looking through the options I thought shabu shabu would be good. I had wanted to take Georgia and Ali out for it anyways, and considering everyone liked the konro course the previous night, and shabu shabu is beef rather than fish, we were all looking forward to supper. And it was delicious! But first there was a surprise appetizer of tofu and then another of sashimi (sliced raw fish). And then more shabu shabu food than we could ever hope to eat. And when we were thoroughly stuffed with at least a third of the food still left our server brought a bowl of noodles!
(above from left to right) unexpected appetizer #1: burdock root tofu with a unique cocktail, unexpected appetizer #2: sashimi with shrimp (also raw) and two dipping sauces, and finally our shabu shabu meal with plate of veggies, meat, and broth with jars of dipping sauces in the background
One of the many secondary buildings that make up the palace
April 29th - Imperial Palace
The next morning, after yet another large breakfast, we checked out of the ryokan and traveled into the heart of Kyoto proper to visit the Kyoto Imperial Palace. Luckily we were just in time for the free English tour! The tour follows the same route through the grounds that the self-guided tour does, but you get lots more information since there aren't many sign posts and our guide even had a couple extra pictures printed out.
One of my favourite facts is that they can harvest the cypress bark for the roofs in such a way that they don't damage the tree long-term and they can harvest more bark from the same tree years later. Also, originally all the buildings were connected by hallways so the Emperor wouldn't have to step on the ground, but some hallways and buildings have been removed to create gaps to hopefully stop a fire from spreading, should one occur. Like many of the historic buildings here, the palace has a history of burning down.
(for more photos of the Imperial Palace, see the previous post)
A noble's house nearby that has since been converted to a tea house
Yasaka Shrine
After the palace we found a small shop that served gyoza for supper. I tried to choose something more familiar for Ali and Georgia considering their trial-by-fire experience so far with the kaiseki meals. Gyoza are the Japanese version of Chinese dumplings. The fillings are similar, but instead of being boiled the Japanese prefer to pan fry and steam them. The gyoza were better received than all the raw fish, and then we walked to the Pontocho river to rest our feet for a while. We waited for the sun to go down before walking to Yasaka Shrine to visit at night with all the lanterns.
Because it was a slightly drizzly day there weren't too many people around which was nice, and Ali saw a few cats to chase for pictures.
April 30th - Nara
On the 30th we took the train to Nara nearby. They are famous for their wild deer that you can feed if you buy crackers from one of the handful of vendors around. Spiritually, the deer are considered to be messengers from the gods so they are protected. Since they are roaming free they can choose to ask for food, or wander off into the nearby woods, or go to a designated "no human" zone. The deer are very accustomed to people, and know that pockets often have crackers. They also know that if they startle someone they are more likely to either drop or give crackers so in the busy areas you certainly have to keep your eyes on the deer, even if you don't have any crackers yourself. I was happy to leave the feeding to Ali, I really admired her ability to command a group of them all at once! And I suppose they are rather cute.
We didn't have a solid plan for the day, and unfortunately most of the museums we tried to visit were closed because of a national holiday so we wandered around to see what there was to see. We ended up at a shrine on a hill which was sheltered in the trees which was lovely, and then we walked through the forest to a neighbourhood nearby where we found a small local restaurant for lunch which was delicious.
We wandered through a few local parks, and ended the day at a botanical garden as it started to rain, before we had to catch a train back to Kyoto.
May 1st - Tokyo
May 1st was another travel day, this time back to Tokyo! We arrived around lunch time, so we started by leaving our bags at our hotel before trying to find lunch. We were near Ueno station, but it was raining somewhat heavily which made it a difficult day to be casually out for a walk.
We ended up at an okonomiyaki place for lunch, which was interesting for me to compare to the okonomiyaki in Hiroshima. It's a super popular meal there, but different regions include different ingredients and assemble them in different orders so there was some trial and error in our cooking methods in Tokyo.
We decided to take some of the afternoon to relax and read some books that we had, and I took part of the evening to look into how I was going to do a work interview while travelling. (I had some idea it was going to happen, and thankfully it was asychronous so I didn't have to be awake in the middle of the night but still. There are logistics to sort out.)
May 2nd - Fuji day
May 2nd was our day to travel to Mt Fuji! I found a place nearby where we could take a soba making workshop, so after the usual train + rental car drive and a little bit of getting lost on the way we made soba for lunch! We measured our flour, added water, and kneaded the dough. Then the instructor showed us how to roll and then fold our dough to be cut by hand. Watching videos of soba masters cut the noodles by hand is amazing, and like so many things in life, the professionals make it look so easy! I feel a little bad for whoever had to cook our noodles since they were all different sizes, but that just meant we had a range of textures to choose from for our lunch!
Once we made the noodles, the staff cooked them. They provided us with a dipping sauce, some toppings, and some tempura to eat with our noodles. In order to have a large enough batch to make and cut we ended up with more noodles than we could hope to eat. But it was a very fun time!
Unfortunately it was a rather grey, cold, and cloudy day so Mt Fuji was hiding behind clouds for the entire time we were there. We only saw the top for a moment as we got on the highway to drive back to Tokyo! There were a few moments where you could get a glimpse of the sides and we did find some cherry trees that still had their blossoms!
As we headed back to Tokyo we once again stopped in Akasaka like I had done with mum and dad. However, rather than a Japanese restaurant we chose to get burgers from the best burger restaurant Jesse and I have found so far. It's called "The Counter" and the Roppongi location is the Japanese branch of an American custom burger chain. Despite having been many times and having no troubles previously, their digital ordering system was acting up for us which sucked. But the food was delicious and we were all stuffed to the gills when we left.
Our soba and tempura lunch
May 3rd - Last day in Tokyo and interview
This was the last day in Japan for the other two and they went to visit the Tokyo Metropoolitan Government Building and Hamarikyu Garden, but unfortunately I had to take the morning to do my interview. Literally everything went wrong so it took me about 3x as long as I expected, but I got it done and have since learned I passed! We met up at Ueno station in the afternoon and Georgia and Ali did a magnificent job making it on time to catch an earlier train to the airport, so we arrived with plenty of time to spare.
Up next: Australia!
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