Kyoto - Day 1

I've learn't a tremendous amount on this trip, and today was no exception. Today I learnt that I must hate myself, or at least my body. It's the only explanation that I can fathom for the suffering I cause myself.

Somewhere in the last 72-hours I left Tokyo and headed down to Osaka. It's not really clear to me, but I have receipts from hotels that show me that it really did happen. My friend from Hakuba is now living in Osaka so it didn't take very long at all before we were in a bar. For the whole of my time in Osaka, I really didn't see anything about Osaka. In fact, I've been in Kyoto now for only 6 hours, but I know it a hundred times better than Osaka :P

I did, however, have a tremendous time. Darts are surprisingly popular in Japan and they have these wicked electronic boards that automatically tally up the score so the player doesn't have to think (the main reason I never really liked darts in the past). James, myself, and a friend of his stumbled upon a darts bar on Sunday night and proceeded to get friendly with the staff. I now have a local in Osaka, a fact of which I'm rather proud. We drank until 4am, following which we stumbled home and I proceeded to sleep until 4pm that day.

After getting up at 4pm, we were at a restaurant enjoying some Shochu by 6pm. Our local darts bar had a competition running until 10, so we spent until then staying downstairs at a middle-eastern themed bar and enjoy some Shisha. This was a first for James and I, but it was surprisingly not too bad. It is essentially a very light flavoured tobacco smoked from a rather elaborate looking bong. Obviously, it's clean, otherwise I wouldn't have touched it. But it was not harsh or strong, had a nice grape flavour, and lasted us about an hour. I wouldn't really go out of my way to find it again, but none the less, it was a good experience.

At about 11 we were back in the darts bar, chatting with the staff and allowing them to play with us as well. We had our collective arse handed to us. It was still fun, however, I managed to get 17 shades of off-my-face by about 4am, when we did the traditional 'hang out outside a 7-eleven, eat microwave burgers, talk far too loud, but try to convince the locals that we're americans' thing.

4 hours later, it was time to check out and head to Kyoto. My hangover wasn't all that bad, but it was still rather apparent, the lack of sleep did my no favours, and the 20kg pack on my back felt a lot heavier than it really was. Regardless of this, I decided to walk the 5km from Kyoto station to my hotel. And, I enjoyed it!! What made this even more strange was that even after a 5k walk carrying 20kg on my back, I decided I'd like to get a bike, of all things, and ride around Kyoto. Part of me knew this was a stupid, stupid idea. But another part of my knew that I really would love it and it would be heaps of fun. And it was!

Kyoto, I have to be honest, was never going to be my favourite destination. In fact, if not for the fact that everyone told me I had to go, I probably wouldn't have gone at all. But, like most things I wasn't sure I wanted to do, I am now immensely glad that I did.

Kyoto has a population of about 1.4 million, and sits only about 60 minutes drive from Osaka. It was, for almost a thousand years, the capital of Japan until that privilege was moved to Tokyo in the late 1800's. It has resisted every attempt to modernise and sit as a rare jewel, offering a glimpse of the Japan that was, so long ago.

It is also a buddhist mecca, of sorts. Housing over 2000 temples. Not really my sort of thing, but they are incredibly beautiful.

I've got a one hour limit here, sorry, and I think it's time for me to go, so I'll cut this short. I really like Kyoto, and highly recommend it. Especially if you like the arty or religious stuff. I also strongly suggest that when you get here you rent a bike. It costs about $15/day, but the city is nice and flat. Kyoto is ideal for a cycling tour since it's major attractions are not as close to each other as they are in other cities. Cycling in Japan is unlike cycling in Australia. Helmets are never worn, but bikes and pedestrians share footpaths with ease. Most footpaths in Kyoto also have half of the pavement allocated to bikes, and the other half pedestrians.

One last quick point, Lonely Planet really is shit. It is thoughtful enough to offer the location of a bicycle parking lot (they really have these) on the map, but somehow the idea of putting a bicycle rental store on the map just passed them by, not quite entirely. They mention that there are bicycle rental stores, near the train station, but that's it! What good is a bicycle parking lot if I can't get my hands on a freakin bike!

Less than two weeks now! Miss you all heaps! I hope everyone is happy and healthy.
Mike