Kyoto in the rain

The Golden Pavilion

Kyoto has 17 UNESCO World Heritage Sites, so you can imagine there's a lot to see around town. The problem this morning however, that there was a lot of rain around too.

We took breakfast and pondered what to do. There were a number of options, getting wet was high on the list. Jiman was at a loss as what to do too, apart from wanting to visit some onsen (heated public baths) at some point in the day before he headed off back to Tokyo on the night bus at 10 p.m., so we offered to go around with him. We all wanted to see Kinkaku-ji temple in northern Kyoto, billed as one of the most well-known sights in Japan. It was just six stops away on the local bus route, so we hopped on the 59 and were there at 10.30, just after the rain decided to come down again after a brief respite.

The centre-piece of Kinkaku-ji is the Golden Pavilion, which is an exact reconstruction of the 1397 original, which some monk decided to burn down in an act of madness in 1950. Even with the crowds, it’s a stunningly beautiful setting.

We jumped back on the 59 bus down to the Higashiyama district, which lies on the eastern side of the city, and is likewise famous for its shrines and temples. By the time we alighted it was coming down quite hard and we sauntered up the hill to Kiyomizu-dera, a temple which dates back to 798. Kyoto lies in a basin which is surrounded on three sides more or less by mountains and many of the temples and shrines around the city are located in the foothills as is Kiyomizu-dera. We spent most of the time here sheltering under the temples structures. We were approached at one point by a group of children who asked us if we would speak English with them from a specially prepared list of questions. We were more than happy to oblige and place our signatures at the bottom of the list of answers. I asked if they would converse with Raph in Japanese, but that obviously wasn’t part of the deal. Still I demanded we had our photographs taken with them and they did offer us a small gift (but haven’t quite worked out what it is yet).


"Can you speak English with us please?"

The whole edifice juts out over the hillside. Underneath is a well, whose waters are believed to have therapeutic properties, so being tourists, we did the touristy thing and imbibed.


Longevity guaranteed

The rain slackened off as we continued the trail through Higashiyama, but not for long. Kodai-ji has extensive landscaped grounds which in good weather would have been absolutely perfect, but at least the rain had kept the crowds away. You never can win really.


Kodai-ji, before the rains came down

By now, with the rain streaming down and hunger in our stomachs, we decided it was time for food and shelter and (yet another) rethink of our plans. Jiman took us into a Japanese eatery and we indulged in good food for an hour while we dried ourselves out. Lunchtime meals in Japan are generally half as expensive or - depending on how you look at it - twice as cheap at lunchtime as they are in the evening. A sort of midday happy hour I suppose.

So, given the weather, temple viewing had hit the buffers for the day and instead we headed off to the International Manga Museum in the centre of town. In Japan, manga easily rivals mainstream text-based literature as a source of reading and this becomes eminently apparent when you step onto any subway train in the morning or evening rush-hour. For those that don't know, manga means 'random' and ‘picture' in the local lingo and is more or less synonymous with comic strips in the west. But Japanese manga of course, has become a cult in the West too, so it was fascinating to read about its history and development.

JIman had departed by now and had headed off to immerse himself in a hot bath before the deprivations of an overnight bus ride to Tokyo. He had been good company, was good at people skills and making contacts with the Japanese (even though he understood not a word of their language). Sometimes it is good to have someone else around to put a different perspective on things. Thanks for the company Jiman!


There's a great view from the Sky Garden

As for ourselves, I was so sick and tired of the rain, I suggested we take the bus back to the hostel by way of the main railway station, a striking metal and glass structure – as Lonely Planet puts it: a futuristic cathedral for the transport age.


The main concourse, Kyoto railway station

It has many levels rising to the 15th, which has a so-called Sky Garden with great views around Kyoto (it had brightened up considerably by now). You have to have a head for heights when traversing the 11th-floor aerial walkway over the station's main concourse.


The Kyoto Tower