Lilly's Highlights & Recommendations # 11 (Kyoto/Matsumoto, Japan)

Kyoto Top 5:

1. Temples - Kyoto is the historic capital of Japan (Emperor decamped to Tokyo in 1869) and as a result has an enormous wealth of temples. In fact there are so many, and often in unexpected places (wedged next to a McDonald's on the main shopping street!), that I am only going to describe my top 5 of the many that we saw. So here goes the sub-list!

(a) Ginkaku-ji (Silver Pavillion): although the temple isn't silver it is still very beautiful and surrounded by the most luscious and magical gardens. Like something from Narnia!
(b) Kinkaku-ji (Golden Pavillion): similar to the Silver Pavillion and this time actually gold. The gold leaf is well maintained and it is pretty big so it is quite a sight to behold. Very bling!
(c) Kiyomizu-dera: a big complex of temples built at the top of a valley which makes for nice views and some good structural features of the buildings. The most tourist orientated temple in Kyoto especially the area around the Love Stones (touch one stone, shut your eyes and walk successfully to the other stone and you will be lucky in love!) This manifests itself in a lot of colourful religious offerings and souvenir stalls and tea houses which makes the complex lively and fun.
(d) Sanjusangen-ji: this temple contains 1,000 (lifesize-ish) sculptures of Kannon (goddess of mercy). They are all neatly lined up and seen together are a very impressive sight indeed. No pictures allowed - very strict the Japanese! They also make you take your shoes off before you go inside anywhere which is a pain especially in near freezing temperatures!!! They normally offer you slippers but they are giant and always fall off, which is weird considering the Japanese have such small feet!
(e) Higashi-Hongen-ji - impressive mostly in terms of scale. Two enormous halls next to each other, lovingly restored (ongoing in parts - very organised site; no Health & Safety hazards here!) Bhuddism must be very popular in Kyoto if they can actually fill this place!

2. Palaces - the Imperial Palace tour in Kyoto is both much easier to get onto and much better than the one in Tokyo. This is probably explained by the fact that the Emperor no longer resides at the Kyoto one and it is much more historic. The one hour tour (during which it started snowing which was picturesque especially in the surrounding park) was interesting and the buildings are much more impressive.

Having said that it wasn't my favourite palace in Kyoto. This title goes to the palace within the grounds of Nijo castle. The castle itself is not that impressive but the palace is impressively large and has an amazing collection of screen wall paintings. The best we have seen in any temple so far. It also has a cool feature called a nightingale floor which was purposely designed to squeak as you walk on it so intruders could be heard.

3. Old Kyoto - although it is probably easiest to get around Kyoto on the bus (and there is a good value bus pass) it is also a good walking city. Especially around the temples but also in the old residential and mercantile areas. There are some lovely examples of traditional buildings (and good souvenir shops!) on the cobbled streets around Sannen-zaka and Ninen-zaka. We also had a very pleasant walk along the Philosopher's Path next to the canal up to the Silver Pavillion.

4. Kyoto Station - an enormous modern station, with some fun architectural features (skyway with a good view of Kyoto tower, 11 storey atrium etc.) It is the sort of place that you will either love or hate and some people think it is not in keeping with the historic nature of the city, but considering how awful most stations are as an introduction to a city (Kings Cross???) I thought it was pretty cool.

5. Zen - we saw some lovely gardens in Kyoto including Shosei-en and Konchi-in but my favourite were the elegant zen gardens, identifiable through the raked pebble gardens. There were some excellent examples at the Daitoku temple complex (we also enjoyed a little tea ceremony there with green tea and cinnamon cakes - warming!)

If you aren't feeling very Zen then the entertainment district around Gion and Pontocho is good for shopping, eating and drinking. The street which traditionally houses Geishas is very picturesque at night when it is all lit up with lanterns. We didn't see any Geishas though so no room for this in my Top 5!

We also did a one night stay in Matsumoto. We were there for less than 24 hours but it has four things worth doing (all easily walkable apart from the JUM).

1. Onsen - an onsen is an outdoor bath heated by a hot spring. There was one in our hotel on the roof. It was a lovely experience to soak in the bath while watching the stars feeling absolutely warm while it was 4 degrees and thinking of snow! This was reason enough to stay in our hotel on its own (Hotel Dormy Inn), but I would also recommend it for the clean, modern rooms, great shower and free laundry.

2. Matsumoto castle - in a similar vein to Himeji. Not quite so impressive from the outside but some unusual internal rooms. I liked the moon viewing room.

3. Black and white houses on Nakamachi street - unusual architectural style. Pretty to look at. Nice short walk.

4. Japan Ukiyo-e Museum (JUM) - Japan's largest collection (over 100,000) of woodprints (private collection surprisingly). A pain to get too (we took an expensive taxi but it was freezing!!) but worth it. As usual only a small part of the collection is on display but we saw an excellent Kunyoshi special exhibition as well as some reproductions of the famous Hokusai masterpieces. Best Japanese art museum yet.

Now back to Tokyo for a couple of days....