Balmy Autumn Days in Kyoto
The start of a 12 day solo Japan trip
Twenty nine years after my first solo overseas trip, I decided to do another. When you have a job and family, it’s a little more difficult to organise than when you’re a student, but it can be done.
I loved our family holiday to Japan so much earlier this year, I decided to head back for another 12 days. I felt I had ‘unfinished business’ in one of my favourite countries.
Now I’m back home, I feel sad the trip is over. I’m writing these Substack posts as a kind of therapy to re-live the good times! Twelve days flew by, I could’ve happily spent a month in Japan. This is the first of many posts about my latest visit.
Maybe it’s because I’m from Australia, but I still find it amazing that you can jump on a plane and be somewhere so completely different to where you live within 12-24 hours. The only limitations to doing this are time and money.
Before I knew it, I was at the airport, on a plane, inside a Tokyo hotel, and back at Tokyo Station the next morning to catch the 6.30am shinkansen to Kyoto. The highlight of the 2 hour 450km / 280 mile trip was seeing Fujisan from the right hand side of the train.
Intent on making the most of my 2 days in Kyoto, I had a packed schedule. After dumping my suitcase at the hotel, I walked out of the station to see the famous Kyoto Tower. First up was a short walk to Kurasu, one of my favouite cafes.
This little place 10 minutes west of Kyoto Station serves up one of the best coffees I’ve ever had. A double shot latte was very close to the flat whites I drink here in Australia. The flavour was phenomenal. A lot of people say you can’t get good coffee in Japan, I strongly disagree.
Caffeine in hand, I headed to a tram stop and made my way out to Arashiyama. This area 10km / 7 miles west of Kyoto has many interesting attractions for visitors. The most famous is the Bamboo Grove I visited with my family in April. I was gutted to find out after we’d left that I missed going on the Romantic Train!
Funnily enough, the Romantic Train is anything but romantic. Noisy, windy, packed with tourists, Japanese commentary blaring out of speakers, hard wooden seats. Even the train staff seemed to be a little snappy with their directions. Nevertheless I still enjoyed the 25 minute journey there and back, though it was hard to take photos.
The weather was absolutlely glorious, I wasn’t expecting sunny days with temperatures of 26C / 78F. I walked around Arashiyama looking to grab a bite to eat, but everywhere was rammed with tourists. I ended up eating an onigiri (rice triangles with different fillings) and a small tub of ice cream at a tram stop. It was the only place I could find a seat. As I ate I was alerted to my daughter arriving home on our CCTV. It seemed so odd seeing this as I tucked into some ice cream in Japan.
I then walked along the beautiful Katsura River, watching people have fun rowing boats with the backdrop of the lush hills behind. My next stop was Yusai-Tei Gallery.
Yusai-tei is in a 150 year old Meiji-era building set on a hill overlooking the river. Previously a restaurant and a vacation home for Japanese nobles, it’s now a gallery showcasing unique dyeing techniques.
This isn’t your typical art gallery though - visitors make their own art by taking photos of the reflections set up around the house. The first photo in this post is the famous round window room. Lacquered tables provide opportunities for stunning reflections with the foliage outside. On the verandah, pools of water are set up for similar photo opportunites.
My favourite part of the gallery was not the reflections nor the leaves. Around the back of the building there were 7 or 8 large ceramic pots with bowls and plates on top of them. Pouring water on top of the bowl started off the process of water melodically dripping into each pot.
You can hear a short clip of the sounds below. My wife was not overly impressed, I guess I just love the simple things in life?
Thanks for reading, look out for lots more Japan posts coming up.
Photos in this post
I took all of the photos in this post on the Ricoh GRiii Diary Edition camera, except for Fujisan which was shot on the OM System OM-1.
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I’ve just got my film scans back, so there will be lots of 35mm photos coming soon.
Next post
My next post features photos of a small neighbourhood food market run by a local Shinto temple in Kyoto.
See you next time.
Cheers
Matt
Really nice write-up and I personally loved the addition of the audio ... something I’ve been thinking about myself, additional ways to immerse the reader in the images ... Thanks for sharing
I have been to Japan once and I know what you mean by „you‘ve felt like you had unfinished business there“. It is such an amazing country and I would love to return one day...