Short excursion to Macau

One of the "must things" to do when visiting Hong Kong is to head over to Macau, which is only a 1-hour ferry ride away. Most people just go for a day trip, but since we had a week in total in HK, we decided to spend the night there (also, we figured Raphaelle and Olivier would appreciate a bit of privacy...). So, bright 'n early on Wednesday morning, we got up, headed to HK central, from where we got on the ferry to Macau.

Macau, like Hong Kong was a European colony until the end of the 20th century. Portugal seeded Macau back to China in 1999 (making it the last European colony in Asia, actually). These days Macau enjoys similar autonomy as Hong Kong (that is, China handles defence and foreign policy, and the rest is handled by Macau). Thanks to its status as world capital of gambling, Macau boasts the world's highest GDP per capita by purchasing power parity.

After arriving in the harbor, we jumped on the shuttle bus which took us to our hotel (which, considering the 60 Euros we paid for the room, was a rather luxurious affair!), located not too far away from the city center. After dropping off our bags at our room, we headed off to explore Macau. We started off by navigating the chaotic streets of Macau up to the Fortaleza do Monte. At first glance, the prosperity of Macau wasn't obvious, it seemed like a very busy, rather unremarkable Chinese town. (similar to Hong Kong, yet also clearly different - both as far as architecture and atmosphere is concerned).

Fortaleza do Monte is quite a well-preserved military installation, overlooking Macau from its hilltop, dating back to 1617. This was the military center of Macau during colonial towns - these days it houses a museum dedicated to Macau's history. We didn't visit the museum, but did checkout the impressive views over Macau from up there. This was also where Macau was governed during the early days of the colony.

We then walked down into the focal point of the historical center of Macau; the ruins of Saint-Paul's church. It is one of the most famous landmarks of historic Macau - but actually only the facade remains. Behind the church, there is a Chinese temple - a symbol of religious harmony during colonial times I suppose?

We had a bit of a walk around the historic center - which is extremely touristy, it has to be said. There are plenty of shops that cater for tourists' need (the vast majority being Chinese these days, there was more dried fish on sale than traditional Portuguese pastries). We found a cozy-looking and not too touristy looking restaurant on a side street where we had lunch (I had a small hamburger, and a durian milkshake).

We continued our exploration by checking out the Protestant cemetery, a surprisingly interesting place. Macau was of course primarily Catholic, being a former Portuguese colony, but there were plenty of Americans and Brits, who were consequently buried in the Protestant cemetery (well, apart from the Catholics, of course). A quite peaceful place, all in all, and it was kind of morbidly interesting to trace the destinies of colonists here in Macau based on what was written on their tombstones... There was an interesting, well-groomed park next to the cemetery, which seemed to be overran by elderly Macau men playing mahjong and other card games.

We then started walking back to our hotel, stopping my at Lou Lim Lok garden, quite a nice little garden (apparently based on Suzhou style gardens from mainland China). We still came to the conclusion that we prefer Japanese gardens over Chinese ones, though.

Before dinner, we enjoyed the hotel swimming pool for a bit - gotta stay in shape, right? For dinner, we'd booked a Portuguese restaurant. After some miscommunication with the taxi driver, we eventually ended up at the restaurant. We had a rather nice meal at the restaurant - nice to have a bit of European wine as well (it's been a while since the last time!). I was a bit disappointed by the fact that the cuisine seemed purely Portuguese (I was hoping for some sort of fusion between Chinese and Portuguese food).

What to do at night in Macau then? Easy question to answer, go check out the casinos! So we jumped on a local bus, and crossed the bridge from the mainland to Taipa island, where the new casinos are located (Macau town center is actually located on the Chinese mainland). The first impression for us was one of "wow". They don't do things halfheartedly in Macau, these monster casinos must surely be as impressive as anything Las Vegas has to offer (can't say for sure as I've never been...).

We started at the most famous of them all, the Venetian. The place is, as expected, ridiculous. It's the 7th biggest building by area in the world, and the biggest one in Asia (it measures a ridiculous 980,000 square meters). It's also the biggest casino in the world. And it's not only a casino, the shopping facilities are just ridiculous (I'm pretty sure there are more shops in this place than all of Helsinki...). The theme here is all about Venice - the shopping floors are basically remodelled after Venice, with gondolas, a fake blue sky and canals all there to keep us entertained. Kind of reminded us of Marina Sands in Singapore. (unsurprising as it's operated by the same group, Las Vegas Sands).

We also checked out the nearby Parisian resort, which was nearly as ridiculous. The Parisian hotel has been developed by Las Vegas Sands as well. We were less impressed by the Parisian than by the Venitian, for some reason, in spite of the half-scale Eiffel Tower located next to the casino (I wanted to go up to the top to do a bit of night photography, but that was forbidden unfortunately due to the ongoing typhoon alert).

Well impressed, and happy to have resisted to the temptation to gamble (not that hard actually since the minimum bet was about 100 Euros...), we took the bus back to the hotel, and collapsed in our beds, exhausted after a very fulfilling yet tiring day...

The next day, we started off by a session at the hotel pool before continuing our exploration of Macau. We took a local bus to Taipa island again, the plan being to explore Taipa village, which is supposed to be the best-preserved bit of "old Macau" (kind of surprising as it's located not to far from the sprawling Casino developments of the Cotai strip). It was indeed a rather pleasant place to stroll around. The place was definitely less touristy than the colonial center in Macau, while still retaining a distinctly colonial feel.

We found another Portuguese restaurant, where we decided to stop for lunch. We had duck and suckling pig, yummie...

Before heading back to Macau, we decided to check out Cotai strip by daylight. It's definitely more impressive by night, when the ridiculously over-the-top constructions are lit up, but those buildings still looked damned big by daytime, too! Still, I would definitely recommend going by night (obviously, there are also more people in the casinos then).

Before catching the ferry back to HK, we decided to check out another fortress on Guia hill, as it's located just next to our hotel. Again, the views from up there were very impressive. We struggled a bit to find our hotel, as we ended up on the wrong side of the hill, but we found it eventually. And then, alas, it was time to head back to HK.

All in all, a very interesting little excursion. Macau definitely merits the detour from Hong Kong, as it's quite an interesting little place with its own unique character and history.

New Territories and Hong Kong island

Having tackled Lantau island over the weekend, we decided to continue our exploration of HK by checking out the New Territories. New Territories are a part of HK that were added to the colony (then under British control) later than Kowloon and Hong Kong. Hence, there isn't much in terms of colonial heritage to see here. The place bears quite a close resemblance to mainland China though, apparently... (can't really say since I've not yet visited mainland China).

We started off by visiting the 10000 Buddhas monastery (Man Fat Tsz). It's not actually strictly speaking a monastery, as the place was built by a Buddhist layman and his disciples in 1949 (there are no monks resident at the "monastery". The 10000 Buddhas which has given the temple its name, refer to the 12,000 (!!!) Buddha statues that line the footpath leading up to the temple. Construction of the temple was quite a Heraculean effort, as the "monks" carried all the building materials up manually to the temple site! It took a total 18 years to complete the buildings and the main buildings.

It's a pretty impressive place to visit, especially the walk up to the temple is quite impressive, with all the Buddha statues holding different poses leading the way. The temple itself is not quite pretty, but not quite as impressive as the temple we went to yesterday. Also, based on what I've seen so far, I definitely prefer Japanese temples to Chinese ones. Somehow, Japanese temples are just more harmonious and beautiful - one sometimes gets the impression the main purpose of Chinese temples is to impress. That's not to say the temple wasn't worth the visit, though!

After a rather tasty and very cheap lunch at a very local restaurant not far from the temple, we carried on our exploration of the New Territories. Our next stop was a fortified village. These Chinese villages used to be very common in Canton and in what is now Hong Kong - basically local fishermen used to have to fortify their villages to protect against attacks from pirates. These fortified villages have mostly disappeared, apparently, but a few remain in Hong Kong (mostly in the New Territories). The one we visited was quite a fascinating place, located right next to a huge housing estate. It doesn't look like a very interesting place from far away, but close up it's a different story. The doors and archways have Chinese traditional decoration, the place really gave one the impression of going back say 100 years back in time. I hope these places will be preserved, I suppose time will tell...

Our next stop in New Territories was the Hong Kong Heritage Museum, a rather modern museum containing a number of more and less interesting exhibitions. The one that caught our eye was - of course - the exhibition on Bruce Lee, one of Hong Kong's most famous residents. The exhibition gave pretty interesting insight into Bruce Lee's brief but intensive life (there were also some pretty cool clips of his most classic action scenes). One interesting point that Raphaelle pointed out about the exhibition was, though, that they mentioned nothing about his "mysterious death" (no mention about his son Brandon's even more mysterious death). The rest of the museum was interesting enough, even if I didn't have much time to check out the rest of it.

And then, alas, it was time to head back to Kowloon and take our ferry back to Discovery Bay. We spent a few minutes taking in the stunning Hong Kong skyline which can be seen across the sea from Kowloon. We continued to enjoy the marvelous view as we took the legendary Star Ferry across to Hong Kong island. The Star Ferry started operating back in 1888, and is still in operation (judging from all the black smoke the ferry belches during its journey, the ferries don't get upgraded very frequently...).

The next day, it was time to explore Hong Kong island (that is, after all, where most of the main attractions and famous sites are located). We set off to explore with  Raphaelle (Olivier had a rendez-vous at the French embassy, and would join us later). We started at the Western end of Hong Kong island. We were immediately immersed in a very different facet of Hong Kong compared to what we'd seen so far. This is the Hong Kong that can be seen in some of Wong-Kar Wai's films - a place full of life, small shops and interesting scents coming from all directions. (none of the famous skyscrapers were to be seen here).

We started our exploration at the central market building, which was unfortunately shut. Undeterred, we continued, checking out a rather fascinating little temple/shrine, which was discreetly hidden in a residential building (there are plenty of these small, intimate temples in Hong Kong - in many ways they are more interesting than the big, more famous and therefore very touristy places). We continued walking through a rather interesting mixed neighborhood (there was a mixture of basic aliments shops, but also pretty fashionable places that wouldn't look out of place in San Francisco or Tokyo). We ended up in another temple called Man Mo (where Ollie joined us), apparently an interesting place, famous for its numerous incest coils in the ceiling. Unfortunately, the fact that the temple was being restored detracted quite a lot from our visit. Still, an interesting place.

We then continued our stroll towards Admiralty, where we had a lunch date with an old mate of mine from London, Martin. (or Mr. Martin, as he is known as in HK, or at least where we were having lunch). The landscape got progressively modern as we made our way towards Admiralty, which is the modern part of Hong Kong, where the financial district is located and so forth. So the traditional Chinese shops were replaced by modern shops, restaurants catering for expats, and skyscrapers. Still, HK very much maintained a quite different feel from say Tokyo or Singapore (decidedly more Chinese, not a surprise of course!)

We were lunching with Martin in the same building where he works, in a Dim Sum restaurant with a rather splendid view over Admiralty and towards Kowloon. I love Dim Sum, I've had plenty of it in London. As expected, the Dim Sum here was some of the best I've ever had - and not very expensive either! Great to catch up with Martin too, whom I've not seen since Aki's wedding which was years and years ago (he moved to Hong Kong from London 5 years ago). Life in HK hasn't changed him, still the same nice guy. He even showed us his office, and the splendid view he has from up there.

Our tummies filled & appetites sated, we carried on exploring HK island, heading to Victoria park, a wonderful little oasis of peace and quiet, surrounded by the hustle and bustle of HK. The views from there towards the skyscrapers are pretty nice. We also visited the famous aviary, where we got to observe a large array of birds, all free to fly around as they wish. (well, they can't leave the aviary, obviously, but it's a pretty big cage).

The next thing to do, of course, is to take the famous tramway up to Victoria Peak. It must be one of the steepest tram rides in the world, as the tram only covers a distance of 1,4 kilometers, while climbing up to an altitude of 400 meters. The tram is a sort of public transportation that whisks tourist up the hill, but also locals (there are plenty of fancy mansions and apartment complexes on the slopes of Victoria Peak).

The views from the top are predictably stunning - Hong Kong can be seen almost in its entirety from up there (both the Hong Kong side and Kowloon). Needless to say, I was rather busy with my camera. Me, Mathilde and Ollie decided to do a 2 hours walk around the peak (Raphaelle had had enough and decided to head back to DB). It was a rather pleasant stroll, which offered some more nice views over Hong Kong island and the surrounding islands. (the view was often obstructed by rather big trees, so I wouldn't call it a panoramic walk as such, though).

We took a scenic bus back down to the Central Station, from where it was a short walk to the ferry terminal. We were treated to some quite views over some of the rather upmarket neighborhoods on the way down (including a place called Guildford, which rather made us laugh, since Guildford, Surrey was where all three of us used to live back in the UK). We also passed through Happy Valley (a neighborhood very popular with French people, apparently, where Martin lives, also famous for its horse race track).

And then, time to head back to Discovery Bay, after a very rewarding day of exploring HK!

Exploring Lantau island

Our good friends Raphaelle and Olivier recently moved to Hong Kong. In addition to that, Mathilde's cousin Emeric (whose wedding we attended just before starting our Asian adventure) also lives in HK. So, it was pretty obvious that a visit there was on the cards.... Since we have a one week break in our language school schedule, it was a good time slot to go for it.

Our flight to HK went smoothly enough. We took a bus from the airport to Raphaelle and Olivier's flat, which was located in Discovery Bay (aka. DB to locals), actually on the same island (Lantau) as the airport. A short hike uphill led us up to the wonderful flat (the view from their balcony really is impressive - and gives immediate proof for the fact that HK is much more than just highrise buildings).

We immediately headed off to explore the island. Lantau is actually a quite undeveloped island (although that is apparently about to change...), with plenty of hiking trails to explore. Discovery Bay is a bit of an expat enclave, very few locals to be seen (unless you count the mostly Philippine maids who live on the island). Anyway, we had quite a nice introductory walk around DB - I even made it up to a Trappist monastery! (which was closed, unfortunately)

We finished in DB for a couple of well-deserved drinks, followed by a rather non-Chinese dinner in an expat restaurant. It was kind of a nice change to actually have non-Asian food for a change (after two months of pretty much exclusively Japanese food).

The next day, it was time to head off for some serious exploration. Our first stop was at Tai O, a rather curious Chinese fisherman village located on Lantau. It's very Chinese and very authentic indeed, with wooden houses built on wooden poles, and some real fisherman actually seem to live there as well (judging from all the fish drying outside the houses, and the smell of fish that prevails). Definitely not what I expected to see in Hong Kong!

One of the touristy things to do in Tao O is to take a boat tour around the village and out in the sea as well, in the hopes of spotting some dolphins. Cynical as we were, we didn't expect to see any dolphins, so imagine our surprise when we saw not only one, but several dolphins. And our surprise was even greater when we realized they were pink!  We were also treated to the impressive sight of the ongoing construction of what will be the longest bridge in the world (a bridge that will connect Hong Kong to nearby Macau).

The boat tour done, we had a walk around Tao, very much enjoying it. It's a very buzzing place, with loads of busy shops lining up the roads (selling mostly dried fish, which didn't really tempt us, to be honest). It was very touristy in a certain way, but since nearly all of the tourists were Chinese, it didn't actually feel that touristy, somehow. The plan was to have some local Chinese food, but we found a lovely place located by the water, with great views over the village, that we decided to lunch there, even though they only served pizza (and the pizza wasn't all that good, to be honest).

Chinese fishing village ticket off the bucket list, we carried on to check out THE major tourist attraction on Lantau, the Big Buddha. The Buddha, sitting on a hilltop, watching over the surrounding lush countryside (including the majestic Po Lin monastery), measures an impressive 34 meters. It's not actually a historic attraction as such, as construction of the statue was completed in 1993! (it took 12 years to complete).

Before walking up the 286 steps up to the Big Buddha, we decided to visit the aforementioned Po Lin monastery. It was a pretty impressive place, even if a bit overran by tourists (like us). The monastery dates back to 1906 (it seems older than that). The big hall housing loads of Buddha statues behind the main temple was particularly impressive. We were also treated to the spectacle of some monks chanting in the main temple building... Before tackling the Big Buddha, we decided to have a few refreshments and sweets at the temple's veggie restaurant.

We then walked up to the Big Buddha. The views from up there were predictably stunning, especially since we were lucky enough to have sunny weather. After enjoying the views for a bit, we made our way towards the cable car station, checking out a rather uninteresting street full of tourist trinket shops.

So far, we've very much enjoyed Hong Kong, even if what we have seen so far (nature, a fisherman village, a Big Buddha statue) doesn't really correspond to our image of HK!

A quiet week in Tokyo

The last week or so has been extremely busy, with a sumo tournament, some Iaido, a trip to Kyoto as well as my brother and Katja visiting (not to mention attending intensive Japanese courses). Not that I'm complaining or anything.... So, since the weather was pretty bad to boot, and we had a trip to Hong Kong to look forward to, we had a rather quiet week for a change. We did get up to a few things, though.

One place we really enjoyed visiting last year was Mitaka, a small town located at the Western outskirts of Tokyo, famous due to the fact that the Ghibli museum is located there (we visited it last year). So we decided to visit it on a not-so-rainy Wednesday, before our Japanese course. The idea was to try to relocate a nice area near the train station, where we had checked out quite a few nice, quirky shops. However, we struggled a bit to find the place. We got diverted (my fault!) into visiting a couple of modestly interesting temples (let's say they didn't overly impress as after a weekend in Kyoto...).

We then walked through the rather nice Inokashira park (where the Ghibli museum is located), after which we realized it was time for lunch. We found a rather nice restaurant specializing in beef tongue - very tasty indeed! That's the cool thing about Japan, and Tokyo in particular, there are just so many restaurants to discover, a lot of them specializing in very specific types of dishes. A pity we're not good enough at reading Japanese to identify just what each restaurant specializes in!

Thursday night, we decided to head into Asakusa for a nice evening walk, and a bit of shopping. Asakusa is one of my favorite parts of Tokyo, as it's one of the areas of Tokyo that still has a bit of that "Shitamachi" atmosphere. Shitamachi is a term used to describe the area roughly speaking east of the imperial palace - it's where the lower social classes used to live (the rich folks lived in the hillier Yamanote, west of the imperial palace).

As Asakusa has mostly been spared of most modern developments, the place s very different indeed from ultramodern parts of Tokyo like Shibuya, Shinjuku & Roppongi. Anyway, we enjoyed a rather nice evening walk along the Sumida river. We also visited the Asakusa tourist information center (Asakusa caters to a lot of tourists since there's also quite a lot of cheap accomodation there). It's a pretty cool place actually, with  some exhibitions about Asakusa, and best of all, a panoramic terrace from where there are quite nice views over Asakusa and the Sensoji temple (a shame I didn't bring my camera - my smartphone is not particularly good for low-light photography).

On Friday night, we decided  to head for dinner with  our culinary guide Matsuoka-san. As always, we had a fantastic tim. He took us to another place that would basically be almost impossible to find by just strolling around randomly (the place is discretely hidden on the second floor of a building near the train station). The food was of course great, as always. They had "erotic sake" on the menu, which we just had to try (there was some French writing on the bottle - not sure whether that's what made it "erotic"?). We also tried some sparkling sake, which I didn't even know existed. 

Weekend in Kyoto

We've visited Kyoto twice so far already, and were surprised to find ourselves a bit underwhelmed on both occasions. The first time around, we were too much in a hurry to see the most famous temples (which were very impressive indeed, don't get me wrong) to really have the time to walk around and get a feel of Kyoto. And the 2nd time around, we only had about a day in Kyoto, which we spent mostly in the hypercentre, near the train station (which isn't really the most interesting part of Kyoto -as it's quite modern). So we were quite looking forward to joining Katja and Janne in Kyoto for a 3rd visit. This time around, we were hoping to get to spend a bit more time walking around.

Unfortunately, Janne and Katja were not feeling too good, so it ended up being a bit of a solo visit. We started off by catching a local bus to our AirBnb (hotels were ridiculously expensive, probably due to a national holiday on Monday, so we decided to go for Airbnb this time around), a bit outside the town center, but located near one of the temples we wanted to visit, Ginkakuji (aka the Silver Pavilion). Nobody seemed to be home at our flat (which was attached to a Spanish restaurant), so we decided to head off and visit the temple, and come back later.

Ginkakuji is one of the most famous temples in Kyoto (which is to say it's one of the most famous ones in Japan). Its construction was ordered by the Shogun Ashikaga Yoshimasa in 1460 - the place was supposed to be a place of peace and reflection for him, and then become a Buddhist temple upon his death. Apparently it was a very restful place indeed, since Yoshimasa spent the rather nasty Onin wars (during which Kyoto was pretty much all burnt to the ground) contemplating the beautiful gardens at Ginkakuji.

Mind you, can't blame him, the temple, and in particular the gardens, are about as perfect and harmonious as only a Japanese  temple can be. Ginkakuji may be a bit less impressive than Kinakuji (the Golden Pavillion), since the restored pavilion itself is lacking the original silver color - but the place is still a pretty perfect example of a Japanese temple.



Our minds soothed by the beauty of Ginkaku-ji, we headed off for lunch. One of our Japanese teachers had recommended a good Udon noodle place near Ginkakuji, which we were able to locate. Excellent recommendation, the food was really good. After lunch, we dropped our bags off at the flat, and then continued our exploration of Kyoto.

We decided to walk down the so called Philosopher's Way, a pedestrian route following a canal, which goes past quite a few famous temples. (it starts near Ginkakuji). Along this lovely footpath, one really starts to get the feel of old Kyoto, with the old traditional wooden houses lining up the streets, and the beautiful temples fusing into the surrounding nature.

We stopped by at Honen-in, one of the less famous temples in Kyoto. Yet it's also a sublime place, so calm and harmonious in the middle of nature. What's so fascinating about the temples of Kyoto is that they are really all very different - and Honen-in for example is very different from Ginkaku-ji. Apparently the place is particularly beautiful a bit later on, in October/November, when the arrival of autumn turns the leaves red and yellow.

Our next stop was (of course) yet another tempe, Eikan-do. Again, a sublime place, with both very interesting temple buildings and some stunning gardens. It's a very venerable institution, dating back to the 9th century. The present structure dates back to the 16th century (the temple was destroyed during the aforementioned Onin wars). The temple grounds are very extensive, so we took quite a lot of time to explore it all.

We were starting to suffer from the Temple Overload Syndrome, which happens very easily in Kyoto (similar to the Church Overload Syndrome one can suffer from in Florence), but we decided to bravely push on to Nanzen-ji anyway. Nanzen-ji is one of the most famous temples in Kyoto, belonging to the Zen Buddhist sect. We contented ourselves with just visiting the temple grounds this time, rather than paying the entrance fee (due to aforementioned temple overload syndrome). We were less impressed with this temple than the other ones we'd seen (probably our opinion would be different if we'd have paid the entrance fee), but the impressive Sanmon port is a sight to behold, to be sure!

By now we'd seen enough temples (and anyway, it was getting quite close, so they were all shut anyway), so we decided to head to Gion and towards the town center. Our walk (which again took us through some really beautiful streets that give a pretty good idea about how Japan was like during the Edo Period) took us through the famous Yasaka-jinja, a famous Shintoist shrine, one of the most important ones in Kyoto. It protects and overlooks Gion, the famous entertainment district of Kyoto, home of the famous Japanese geisha.

We then walked on into Gion, which is still quite a fascinating place to visit, even though it has sadly become very touristy. There are still streets that evoke old Kyoto - and on a lucky day, one can even spot a real Geisha (rather than one of the many fake ones, most from Korea apparently??). I believe we spotted a Maiko (apprentice geisha), who was rushing down a busy street (trying to avoid the masses of tourists trying to take a picture of her).

We then started a rather long search for a restaurant in Kyoto. One would imagine that finding a good restaurant in Japan is about as difficult as finding a pub in Dublin, but the fact that most restaurants only have menus in Japanese does make the task a bit daunting sometimes. We eventually found a nice place serving soba noodles. After dinner, we were really knackered after all that walking, so decided to head back to our room to get some sleep. Still, in spite of our fatigue, we were very happy with our day in Kyoto - I really felt like I had finally discovered that "old Japan" that's quite hard to find these days here in Kyoto .

After a really good night's sleep, we got up and headed off to explore Kyoto again. We didn't have much of a plan, and had some logistical issues to deal with as we had to put our bags in lockers at the train station, and also a rather menacing weather forecast to look forward to. Anyway, we managed to eventually find lockers for our bags (not an easy task due to the public holiday coming up), and headed off to continue our exploration of Kyoto. We started, kind of randomly, with Sanjusangen-do, just since we happened to walk past it.

Turns out it's one of the most stunning temples I've ever seen. Well, the temple itself is not actually all that special. But the main building houses a hall, which houses 1001 rather stunning Kannon statues dating back to the 12th and 13th centuries. Since we had no idea what to expect, the sight of all those statues really blew our minds away. I was really gutted photography was forbidden, so no pictures of the stunning main hall, I'm afraid... But anyway, this temple yet again demonstrates the diversity of the sites in Kyoto, yet another temple that's totally different from the ones we'd visited the day before.

We spent the next couple of days to explore the area south of where we'd been the day before, walking in some of the most well-preserved parts of Kyoto. The more I walked around, the more I digged Kyoto. I had truly found the Japan I've read about in Clavell's shogun, the one inhabited by heroic samurais, mighty castles and stunning temples. OK, not that many samurais around anymore, but you get the point. We checked out a couple of other nice temples, Kodai-ji and Kennin-ji. We didn't pay the entrance fee in either case, so probably didn't see the most impressive parts of the temples. Our quota of temples was kind of full for this visit.

Unfortunately, Katja and Janne were still immobilized by a nasty stomach bug, so we only saw them in their Airbnb flat. Thankfully, they got better after we left, so were still able to appreciate Kyoto, as we had done. Our visit was over as well, as it was time to catch our train back to Tokyo (good timing, in the sense that the forecast rain started pouring down).

So, our impressions of Kyoto, then? As I guess you'll have guesses, I really love the place. It definitely merits further exploration! So until next time...