25.11.16 - Narita to Kyoto

Official wakeup time - 3:32am. And boy do I feel refreshed after the long day yesterday. Waking up and my eyeballs don't still feel sore, it's a good feeling.

I check-in with the parents and we make our way down to breakfast at 6:00am. Buffet today! We are very impressed with the buffet - sooo many options. Mostly savory, a lot of Japanese delicacies in the form of pickles, soups and other dishes. But also your standard cereal, pastry and eggs. The machine cappuccino was good, but the instant decaf for Dad not so much. Mom and I each get an array of items including yogurt and fruit, sausage, rice and toast. Dad goes for little salad plates, tofu and fruit. The best Fuji apple - sweet and crunchy. There was also a supplement bar - and yes, it's exactly as it sounds - jars of supplements for whatever you might possibly be deficient in. Very interesting. Can't say I've ever seen that, nor will I probably ever see that again!

After breakfast, we grab our jackets and head outside to walk the garden. It's a cool 43° this morning. Definitely glove weather, possibly even hat and thermal weather as well if it stayed this cool all day, but it should be warming up to the 60°s so probably won't need those. The garden is small but a nice short walk to move the joints. And we even get some fall color change too!

Our Narita Express train is at 11:14am so we plan to catch the 9:50am hotel shuttle bus back to Terminal 1. I didn't know how easy it would be to find the train station entrance from the terminal so wanted to give ourselves enough time. Especially since we needed to buy our SUICA cards as well. I will admit I gave us probably too much time.

The shuttle ride was easy and we get to the terminal in 10 minutes. We don't see a sign for the train station so I ask the information desk and they point me to the elevator. I figured this would be the response since the terminal entrance is the 4th floor and we want to get to the basement. We take the elevator down and lo-and-behold, the signs for the train! That's one thing great about Japan's train stations - they have great signage.

I watched a video on where to find the "Welcome Suica" kiosks so I easily find the kiosk and purchasing three cards. The process is super easy and took all of a minute to do.

We tap into the gates and go down to the platform. And have an hour remaining until our train. Lesson learned - don't give yourself toooooo much time.

As we wait for our train, we watch another come in. They clean the rain upon arrival and flip all the seats back the other way (since we're at the end of the line).

Mom and I walk over to the vending machines and get a coffee and tea drink. Amazing how cheap the vending machines are compared to home - each of our drinks was ¥120. And the bottles are so stinking cute. The best part - you just tap your SUICA card! Like magic. We also brought along some dorayaki from Lawson's as a snack.

We survived the hour-long wait for our train with only the minor mishap of Dad nearly forgetting his backpack on the bench at the platform, and once our Narita Express arrives and is cleaned up, we hop on!

I booked our train to go from Narita to Shinagawa after reading some recommendations to transfer to the shinkansen at a less-busy station than Tokyo Station and I'm so glad I did! After the very smooth ride from Narita, we arrive at Shinagawa Station. There is clear signage for the shinkansen so we follow the signs and tap through the gates.

I pre-booked shinkansen e-tickets before we left for Japan, so once we got our SUICA cards I registered each of our tap cards to the respective shinkansen seats in the reservation. This made it very easy to get through the gates as we only need our SUICA cards and no paper tickets. Definitely the way to go.

Through the gates and into the shinkansen area, now time to find food! The downside to a smaller station, I suppose, is less food options. And when I say that, I mean there is only one option - Plusta Bento. Funny name, but plenty of options between various bento, onigiri and even beer! Thank goodness there was only one bento place, because we had a hard enough time picking what to eat just from this place alone. Bento (and beer) purchased, now to find which platform we need to be on.

We're taking the Nozomi line, which is the fastest of the shinkansen with fewer stops along the way. This specific train - Nozomi 35 - goes all the way down to Hakata in Fukuoka! Kyoto is the halfway point for this train.

As mentioned before, signage is Japan it's fantastic, so we spot our train number on the board and find the platform number. Also important is to follow the sign that lead to your car number as the train has 16 cars. Not a big deal if you take a different escalator down, you'll just walk a bit further to your train car. We locate our escalator and head down to the platform. And our car is located right at the bottom of the escalator. How convenient!

With OJ planning the timing of all this, we have ample time again before our train. Thankfully this time it's only about 20 minutes, which seems like a lot when the trains are punctual down to the minute (probably seconds too). Observing the other tracks while we wait, it's amazing how many other shinkansen come and go in such a short time. One after the other, with what seems like only a few minutes in between trains on the same track.

Our 20 minutes are quickly up and our train arrives. We quickly hop on as they literally only stay for 1 minute before departing. The train was already pulling away from the station before I even got my butt in my seat. Although it's such a smoothe ride that you wouldn't even notice. Quite impressive how smoothe it is.

Finally seated, we dig in to our bento. And it's the nicest bento I think I've ever seen. The tastiest as well! Some things I couldn't even identify, but overall I was extremely impressed by the quality of a train station bento.

The 2-hour ride went by pretty quickly. Kyoto is the third stop from Shinagawa so we breezed all the way down. It was a pretty clear day to see Mount Fuji!

In no time at all we're arriving at Kyoto Station. Similar to hopping on at Shinagawa Station, you have 1 minute to get off the train so we grab our belongings a few minutes before and make our way to the doors. Doors open and we quickly hop off, following signs for the exit. Kyoto Station is not as...shall we say "modern"...as the others, so it's stairs time! It's a short flight and we look for signs for the Nara line to get us to Tofukiji Station (this name makes me think of tofu every time I see it or say it). I first start to take us toward the wrong stairs and see JR Nara Line staring at me across the ticket gates, so we backtrack a few steps and make our way to the platform. And there's a rain sitting there, doors open. Hmm...not sure if this is our train since I realize we're on the wrong platform. But looking at Google maps again, the next train to leave is the one we want and it's this one. Well alright then, on we go! This is a regional express and runs less frequently so we have a few minutes wait before the train departs. And we're the next stop. Crazy how far a train can take you in 2 minutes. Although you probably could've walked it if you really wanted to, no way we were gonna do that dragging luggage with us.

Tofukuji Station is such a funky small station. I follow the signs to our final destination and this time it's a semi-express on the Keihan Main Line. This wait is about 10 minutes or so, not bad at all. But it's surprisingly crowded on the small platform. Our final destination is Kiyomizu-Gojo Station which is at Gojo Bridge, which is less than a five minute walk to our lodgings. And this is where we get our steps for the day, literally. I think we probably had three flights of stairs and one really long flight of stairs. Gotta get that workout in after riding trains for a few hours.

We follow signs for the exit closest to Gojo Bridge and pop out right on the corner. I couldn't resist taking a picture of the Kamo River as we walked over Gojo Bridge.

Arriving at our lodgings, the host is there to greet us and walk through all the amenities of the place. And she is very thorough. I had major information overload and a lot of "hai" as she explained everything. We're staying at Shirasagi Kyoto and it's an awesome location and pretty nice place, on a small street (no cars) along the Kamo River.

After our through lessons on all things house, we say goodbye to our host and head out to grab some groceries. There is a 24-hour FRESCO right around the corner, a 3 minute walk. It feels like a shorter walk than 3 minutes, but that's what Google tells me. We don't really know what we need but grab some basic breakfast provisions of fruit and yogurt. And beer, but not for breakfast.

Getting back to the house, time to find a place for dinner. By now we're a bit overwhelmed by the day (at least I am) so we find a casual eatery down the road that's open - Gojo Paradiso Restaurant & Bar. Also 3 minutes away. Sold. Most people probably don't go to Kyoto for Israeli food...but when you're tired and it's close by, it sounds pretty darn good. And it was good too. We ordered cabbage salad, hummus, pita and roasted eggplant. Just what we needed and not too much food.

Mom has a hankering for something sweet so a quick Google search finds a pastry shop that closes in 30 minutes - 4 minutes away - or a gelato place that closes in a couple hours - 9 minutes away. The 4 minutes wins and we walk by to see what's left since just so close to closing. This place is called Akina's Oyatsu. Once we saw they had monte blanc in the case, that was it. We've been seeing this dessert all over recently so now we get to try it! And we snagged a pear frangipane tarte as well, because why not. They were both good. Not desserts I would reach for often, but tasty.

At some point between dinner and dessert, Mom realized she left her purse at Gojo Paradiso. We both quickly throw on our jackets and shoes, and head back to the restaurant to find her bag. Both Mom and Dad are on my bag watchlist now...yeesh.

Now as I sit here writing up this journal, my eyeballs are starting to burn so I'm going to finish this here. On to exploring Kyoto tomorrow!

Sayonara!