Sunday, July 6, 2025

Per usual I was unable to sleep on the plane, and Scott had nearly no sleep as well. Overall it was an easy direct flight from Seattle to London on British Airways, and we even landed a bit early.

Our route from Heathrow to Canterbury would involve taking the Elizabeth Line to the Thameslink connection to St. Pancras, and then getting on a regional rail line. Thank you Google Maps for outlining this type of navigation which in the the past would have taken so much more work… this GenXer still marvels at times. Navigating ourselves in Heathrow to the Elizabeth Line was surprisingly difficult. Was the signage unclear or were we just zombies? A tap of our credit cards took care of our fares until St. Pancras. We attempted to use the kiosk at St. Pancras for our regional line tickets to Canterbury, but were confused as to whether we should pay for a “peak” or “off-peak” fare. I suppose it being a Sunday should have clued us in, but again… zombies, so we elected to stand in the short queue for a real human.

We had a brief wait for our departure from St. Pancras and sat for a coffee and a treat break at Benugo. Our ride to Canterbury was just about an hour, and the uncrowded train meant both of us had window seats to enjoy the view of the countryside.

The walk from Canterbury West station to our hotel was a pleasant half mile. When we turned left down Mercery Lane and I got my first view of the cathedral I was moved. I had been looking forward to seeing her, but did not expect her to elicit that much emotion.

At the entrance of the cathedral grounds I told them we had reservations at the Lodge and we were ushered right in, past all the poor souls that have to pay for entry. With the Lodge stay we got free unlimited access! We were about three hours early for check-in but of course able to leave our bags at reception.

Scott’s brother and his wife live somewhat nearby in Essex, and Steve was able to come meet us for our first visit in six years! The three of us set off to find pints and food, our first stop at the Bell & Crown which was first licensed in 1862. Later we enjoyed some carb-loading at Franco Manca which specializes in sourdough pizzas.

After all of this nutritional intake we meandered the streets aimlessly until it was time to check-in at the hotel. I knew the Lodge was on the grounds of the cathedral, but didn’t realize exactly how close!

Our room was simple, but well-appointed and clean. The highlight was the framing of the cathedral in our window.

Here’s a little video tour I put together…

At the end of the video there’s footage of a garden at the Lodge that was lovely, and included a really interesting sculpture of Jesus depicted as a middle-aged man. Naturally I didn’t recognize him, but Google helped me out.

After our sojourn, the three of us set out to explore the Cathedral grounds which were quiet in the late afternoon. There were gardens and a cloister, some ruins of an infirmary built in the 12th century, the Chapter House of the old monastery, as well as other points of interest. Really gorgeous spaces – it has been a number of years since I’ve found myself appreciating a cathedral this much, and this was only the exterior!

By this time the lack of sleep was catching up with us travelers, and Steve was ready to drive the 80 miles back home. Our travel/arrival day ended abruptly, and I was asleep by 5:00 pm.

Friday, July 4, 2025

I turned 50 years old in May, which still seems odd to say out loud. I don’t really have a hangup about the number, it’s more that I feel a bit too immature to have earned it if that makes any sense. But then sometimes I’ll have conversations with younger friends, like in their 30s and early 40s and they’ll say something along the lines of “you’ve lived a lot of lives”. I guess that’s true.

Although we travel a fair bit, this felt like the kind of birthday you schedule a special trip for. Something meaningful. To me it needed to feel like an adventure and I wanted something that included a physical challenge. Because, you know, I’m not too old for those kinds of things, right? Yes, I suppose I feel the need to prove something to myself.

Through a very long maze of conversations and online research that I won’t bother detailing here, I managed to settle on a pilgrimage route in Europe. No, not that pilgrimage route. Have you heard of the Via Francigena? I hadn’t before stumbling across it online, either.

“The Via” as I’m apt to call it these days had a few points of appeal for me. One, it terminates at the Vatican. My first real travel abroad experience was a semester abroad in Rome from whence I trace the birth of my travel bug that is never satiated – oh does that make it a parasite? Secondly, it’s pretty obscure and sparsely populated particularly at the start of the journey from England into France and Switzerland. To earn the Testimonium at the Vatican a pilgrim must show proof of having walked only the approaching 100 kms starting somewhere in Italy. And that’s what a lot of people do – start in Italy – leaving the beginning part of the route quite empty of the hoards of pilgrims you might find in Spain. Others report going days without ever seeing another pilgrim, and to me that sounded like perfection. Finally, this is a long ass route. Almost 1400 miles. A fair few do the whole route in one shot walking for months, but for our schedule and purposes this is a Life Project that will take several years of trips to complete. I can’t articulate it, but for some reason that was appealing. I wonder if it’s related to my preference for book series over standalones? I recently finished the Patternist series. Anyway…

We are budgeting 12 days of walking for this chapter, which will take us from Canterbury, UK across the channel into the Hauts-de-France region with a final target of Arras, France.

The planning for this has been pretty intense. Because the first part of the route is not heavily trafficked, you cannot just show up and wing it like you can on some other routes, calling ahead each day to multiple accommodation options to see which one has room. Food options are also somewhat limited in these rural towns. If you care to roll the dice the advice is to carry a sleeping bag and tent so that you can utilize camp grounds or other potential unofficial options if you are stuck. Um, no thank you I’m done sleeping on the ground. Our typical slow travel style involves booking no more than one or two beds over a 1-3 week trip; this was quite different. Not only did I need to book 13+ places to stay, I also had to research how and where we would get food along the route.

Training hasn’t been as intense as one might think. Or perhaps my training hasn’t been as intense as it should have been. I guess time will tell. Primarily we did urban walks up to 12.5 miles in length, wearing clothes we plan to bring and carrying our packs full of the things we plan to bring. The ball of my foot just under my left big toe is prone to blisters. My average walking speed is 3 miles an hour. I haven’t had any upper body pain, and only minimal leg muscle soreness that resolves quite quickly with rest. Taking a break at a brewery around the 8.5 mile mark is ideal. The elevation gains/losses in the area of this first trip aren’t terribly significant so I’ve just been doing flat routes. Again, time will tell.

Our most common training routes have included a shorter one we call “The Fremont Loop”, and then our 12.5 mile route that circles Lake Union and includes a stop at Gasworks Brewing. Beer and smash burgers are good fuel, right?

And then there’s the packing. You have to carry your own stuff every day. You need to be prepared, but limit those “just in case I need it” things. It will likely be really hot walking across farmland in July exposed to the sun, but if it rains the trails can be unbelievably muddy. After several hours of walking every day you’ll also have down time at your destination, sometimes in towns without anything to really do so how do you entertain yourself? Will the items that you wear dry overnight so you can launder them most days? Search the internet for “camino packing list” and you’ll see everyone has an opinion.

After all of the blogs and YouTube videos and guidebooks and social media posts and our own training walks, this is what I’ve settled on that’s worth carrying. I haven’t weighed it, but I’ve done a bunch of long walks carrying my pack with almost everything here, so it’ll be fine, right? Right? RIGHT?

For carrying…
For trail and off-trail walking…
Jackets…
Trail-wear…
For off-trail activities, incl. a few days in Brussels at the end!
Sleepy time wear…
Sun protection…
Hydration…
Hygiene…
Also, hygiene (etc.)…
Leisure time…
Electronics…
Healthcare…

In addition to these physical items, the following are loaded onto my phone as resources for this trip:

The Via Francigena app, that includes downloaded walking maps for offline use (the icon is blue with a white outline of the pilgrim logo)
The AllTrails app with our stages downloaded for offline use as a backup option
The Kindle app, with downloaded copies of Sandy Brown’s Cicerone Guide, and the Chinn/Gallard Lightfoot Guide
The Relive app to track our own path and create videos
TripIt to keep track of all of our transportation and accommodation bookings

Time has run out for my overthinking and overplanning; all that remains is getting on that plane tomorrow…

Friday, August 23, 2024

NCL only allotted a half-day in Ketchikan for today’s port stop, 7AM-1:15PM. And it’s made even shorter by the fact that they dock quite a ways out of town requiring a (complimentary) old yellow school bus shuttle service. You can pay for an excursion that includes transportation, or hire a taxi for a chunk of money. I have vague memories of a $50 one-way price gouge on those taxis but who can blame a town for cashing in on dumb tourists especially when their tourist season is so short.

The great thing about the shuttles is that they are driven by locals who gave us commentary in both directions. On the way in our driver gave us general info about the town, and on the way back to the ship a different driver educated us about local tribe culture based on his own lived experience.

The town was quite a bit bigger than I had imagined, since so much tourist info on YouTube is focused on Creek Street.

We didn’t eat breakfast on the ship, so our natural first stop very near to the shuttle drop-off was Jellyfish Donuts. Perfect solution.

We then headed directly to Creek Street with its historic buildings and gift shops. I knew a creek ran through it (DUH) but was not prepared for the front row seats at the Olympics event of salmon running going on here. Those fish are badass.

We used our remaining time to wander and browse on our path back to the shuttle pick up area.

We stopped into a local book store so I could buy a sticker (always stickers) and Scott had this fortuitous find of his new favorite book:

I did that thing again where I walk into a local yarn shop “just to browse”. Yeah, you know where this is headed. Fabulous Fiber Arts was just too good, and I grabbed two more goodies from Raven Frog Fibers.

You can tell this was too short of a day because the only brewery experience was Scott ducking into Bawden Street Brewing for the fastest pint ever while I was yarn shopping. We definitely need to go back to Ketchikan with a longer port day scheduled or ideally another transportation method.

Back onboard we had our last specialty dinner meal at Q Texas Smokehouse with some live music. We enjoyed the food but again, way too much was served and I ended up feeling bad about the waste. Next time I’ll know to not order every course included in the price.

We finished up our evening with our reserved 10 PM showing of Choir of Man which was really well done!

Wednesday, August 21, 2024

Today was our Skagway, Alaska stop, and we were scheduled to have a long port day here.

We wandered the streets of the very small town. It was quite quaint with pioneer-era buildings and small shops surrounded by an epic natural backdrop.

I got an official Klondike Gold Rush National Historical Park stamp in my NP Passport, and also snagged a couple of extra stamps for my journal. Between those, a couple of stickers, and an artist postcard my journal for this day is quite well decorated.

Despite my insistence that I wouldn’t buy any yarn on this trip, I couldn’t stop myself from wandering into Boreal Artworks/Aurora Yarns “just to browse”. But then I found kits from Raven Frog Fibers that match a book that I already own and will use extensively when we start our RV retirement adventure. I restrained myself and only bought the kit for the NP we would see on this trip (Glacier), but then also couldn’t stop myself from buying this gorgeous yak & silk blend. BAH! Hi, I’m Stacy and I’m a yarnoholic.

We went for a coffee stop at The Sittin’ Sasquatch, sitting in the window to enjoy some people watching. I ordered a cappuccino and the manager/owner (?) warned me it would take a bit to make because they “do it right”. OK, he was not joking. This was one of the best cappuccinos I’ve ever had outside of Roma.

We stopped in at Skagway Brewing for a pint, which was a large-brewery experience. Typically breweries with souvenir shops attached aren’t my jam, but the beer was tasty and we enjoyed their peaceful back patio.

The brewery winner of the day was the much smaller Klondike Brewing. The outside upper deck with a view (that for some reason hardly anyone else noticed?) was perfection and we lingered there for quite awhile.

Scott suggested some more exploring out into a trail area called Yakutania Point and I grumbled. But I went anyway. And thank god we did because… well, Alaska was Alaska-ing on this glorious sunny day.

We eventually made it back to the boat and dressed for our 8:00 pm dinner reservation at Onda, the Italian restaurant. We had a lovely seat next to the window and really enjoyed the food which was much better than they had at the previous Italian specialty restaurant that was called La Cucina. In fact, Onda is probably my new favorite specialty restaurant. My only complaint was that it was SO MUCH food, but they were nice and averted their eyes when we walked out with pizza leftovers (for some reason I don’t think you’re supposed to do that).

Spoiler alert: This ended up being my favorite day of this trip. I know we will love finding Skagway again in the the future when we explore Alaska in our RV.

Tuesday, August 20, 2024

Our first port stop for the cruise was Juneau, AK and it was today. But we also weren’t docking until 2:30 pm and were able to have a leisurely morning and early afternoon, soaking up the scenery in the quiet environments of our balcony and the thermal suite.

We had no specific plans or excursions booked for our time in Juneau, only a rough expectation of wandering through the city and likely checking out their breweries. As we pulled into port I could see how much smaller it felt than its title of State Capital might suggest. Although perhaps exactly the size you would expect knowing that it is the only US capital city that can only be accessed via air or sea.

NCL’s dock in Juneau is about a mile from the center, but we skipped the free shuttle (and the line) and opted to just walk in. The weather was overcast but pleasant.

We walked fairly quickly through the first shopping area we encountered, just off the closer cruise ship docks, that was hyper-touristy. Why are people traveling so far to just buy tshirts and plastic crap made in China?

We did enjoy taking a picture with this sign tho.

We pushed through to what felt just a bit more local (although still obviously surrounded by shops for tourists), and grabbed a coffee at Heritage. We sat in the window for people watching and overheard the barista telling another tourist which shops in town offered authentic indigenous art pieces. She specifically named Mt. Juneau Trading Post as a place that sold pieces made by her family member. That was our next stop, and it was a nice place to browse and enjoy the art. Luckily they had some portable items in my price range for me to pick up… stickers. <face palm>

Juneau also had some gorgeous public art pieces that I really, really loved. Public art is EVERYTHING.

And then on to the important work of the day… three breweries and a food truck court.

Devil’s Club Brewing was our mid-sized visit of the day. A nice variety of styles, and a good mix of locals and tourists inside. Hot tip: upstairs vibe was better (at least the day we were there).

Barnaby Brewing was our small-sized visit of the day, with that somewhat minimalist, industrial feel that a lot of new brewery spaces have. The beer here was my fave of the day, and not just because they had an adorable, friendly cat wandering around. Fun fact: apparently it’s really easy to break Alaska State Law, especially if you were hypothetically going to be visiting three breweries in one day.

UGH… THEY’RE PERMANENTLY CLOSED NOW! BUMMER!

And of course we hit up the ginormous Alaskan Brewing Public House with a big souvenir shop attached. I was part of the problem and bought stickers. Beers were about as good as these big places typically are. I am quite pleased that they haven’t sold out to Budweiser yet though, and Google tells me that as of 2016 they were the 19th largest craft brewery in the world. And their own website tells me that they’re “the 67th independent brewery in the country and the first brewery in Juneau since Prohibition.” That’s pretty cool!

There was a collection of food trucks in (behind?) a place labeled on Google Maps as Gunakadeit Park that looked great. Several options with covered outdoor seating. Definitely a lot of locals there. I indulged in a salmon crepe, and Scott was a monster and had a hotdog made out of Rudolph.

With full bellies and exacerbated liver damage we managed to avoid arrest and walked the mile back to the boat. And we went ahead and grabbed another photo next to the city sign along the way. Because why not? We are freaking adorable.

Once onboard, we were able to catch some end of the evening time in the super quiet thermal suite before heading to our comfy bed.

Until next time Juneau… I enjoyed our time together very much. And you’re right, gray really is the best color.

Sunday, August 11, 2024

When we were in Japan I made it a point to stop into yarn and craft shops because… “Hello, my name is Stacy and I am addicted to yarn and starting knitting/crochet projects.”

I can’t remember where we were honestly, but in one of the larger kind of “big box” craft stores I found a selection of amigurumi kits. I have a couple of pregger friends and thought these would make cute, unique gifts. And unlike my more recent attempts at completing baby blankets, I thought this scale of project might actually get done in time for the births.

Scott helped me pick out a couple of kits, including this whale shark. It came with what you see pictured here – an instruction book, the two yarn colorways, and the eyes. It was all wrapped up in a little plastic box.

Do you know what didn’t occur to me when I bought it all wrapped up in that plastic box? One seriously dumb thing and one fairly reasonable thing. IT DIDN’T OCCUR TO ME THE INSTRUCTIONS WOULD BE IN JAPANESE. I have no excuse other than perimenopause brain. The other more reasonable thing was that apparently Japanese crochet patterns use an entirely different instruction method that uses symbols instead of abbreviations.

I’m not going to post a picture of the inside of this particular instruction booklet (because copyright), but here’s an example of a Japanese amigurumi pattern that I found for free on the internets. Just to give you an idea.

Um, what? Thankfully there are lovely, generous people in the world that have posted many tutorials in the form of blogs and YouTube videos so I could figure this out. It definitely helped that I’ve got a strong handle on crochet in general. Oh and shout out to Google Translate photo feature as well, of course.

The other somewhat dummy thing I did is I didn’t bother to notice that the whale shark’s mouth in the instruction booklet photo is white, and just ended up doing the whole thing in the variegated yarn.

But here’s the finished product! Despite my three layers of ignorance/mistakes, I think it turned out pretty darn cute! And when my friends in St. Louis got it in the mail they texted to say, “Thank you so much it’s adorable!”

Saturday, July 20, 2024

We decided to spend our last full day in Japan in Osaka. Pro tip: pronounced “OH-suh-kuh”, not “oh-SAW-kah”. We hopped on a slow local train out of Kyoto Station and enjoyed the views on the journey. Once in the city we transferred to the subway to get to Dotonbori.

I didn’t do much research on Osaka, but for some reason thought Dotonbori was just a street when in actuality it’s an entire district. The main streets popular for tourists on and near the river were a visual delight with a lot of fun signs and people watching.

The street food was plentiful and we enjoyed steak skewers and fruit skewers (both fresh & candied).

Around 2:thirsty (hey Brian & Carrie!) we conducted a Google search for craft beer and headed to Stand Umineko, which ended up being one of the highlights of our entire Japan trip, honestly. It was that quintessential small, narrow Japanese space, standing room only for maybe 5 people if you’re from Seattle, 8 people if you’re from NYC. The young guy working there was fun to chat with and when he noticed us looking up steak restaurants for later he enlisted two other local patrons for recommendations. We ended up having 3-4 beers of varying sizes each, with my favorite as the saison from Vector Brewing. Full pints were about $11 which is pricey even by Seattle standards (and certainly by Japanese standards), and we ended up spending about $50 USD here. There is some savings in the fact that tipping is absolutely not a thing in Japan. Overall 100% worth it in our opinion.

After the fantastic craft beer experience we set out to find wagyu for our last dinner in Japan. The recommendations given to us at Umineko didn’t pan out for a variety of reasons – already booked, dress code, prefix menus with items unappealing to Scott, etc. – so we were left to our own devices.

Unfortunately we ended up making a poor decision. I’ll blame fatigue and a failure to preplan. We ended up at a restaurant serving hot pot. Our only hot pot experiences have been Chinese-style in Seattle and we have loved them. They are the only exception to my rule that I don’t pay to cook my own food in a restaurant (i.e., I don’t go to Korean BBQ spots). But this hot pot experience just wasn’t as good, I think because they provide boiling water and the expectation is that you do all your own broth flavoring? In our Chinese hot pot experiences the broth base is already well flavored, so I’m not sure if the plain water is typical for Japanese hot pot or what? Regardless, I did not have the skill nor motivation to make great broth from scratch. So in the end we were mostly just eating boiled thin-sliced steak and vegetables. Yeah, it was about as tasty as that sounds.

The most unappetizing moment came as we were walking away from the restaurant and Scott mentioned that we had paid $200 USD for that experience. OMG.

I’m not naming the restaurant here for a couple of reasons. One, I didn’t take the time to capture the name and I can’t easily identify it using Google Maps. Also, the restaurant was full with locals that looked happy so I’m assuming the tasteless food was entirely our fault. Finally, the prices were posted clearly on the menu so what we agreed to pay was definitely and entirely our fault.

I consider eating meh food while traveling a travesty, so I really need to do a better job of planning restaurant destinations for our trips. Especially those first and last meals that become strong memories of a place.

We caught an express train to Kyoto and headed back to our hotel to get packed up for an early departure towards home the next morning.

Thursday, July 18, 2024

Today was for a walk in the mountains, a hike between two villages: Kibune and Kurama. The route includes many points of interest tucked into idyllic nature, and came up as a day trip idea during our pre-trip research. I had asked our Kyoto Free Walking Tour guide about it back on the 13th and he endorsed it. Most people walk from Kurama to Kibune, but I came across recommendations online to do the opposite direction for less overlap with other people, and a more gradual upward slope at the start so that’s what we did.

Google Maps helped us navigate to Kibuneguchi Station via a city bus and the Eizan Kurama line. We encountered this sign when we got off at Kibuneguchi Station and it gives a good overview of the situation. The hiking route we were taking was between Kifune-jinja Shrine and Kurama Station (the dotted line, top to bottom), but our arrival point was the station at the bottom left of this sign with the red triangle.

There was a bus up to the village/Kifune Shrine where the trail starts, but we elected to walk the 1.2 miles along the road instead. It was along a very narrow shoulder, but a few others were doing it as well so we felt safe. Along the way we had lovely views of a river with the occasional waterfall.

About halfway to Kifune Shrine we stopped for cold drinks at Kokon Fujiya and paid the extra ~$6 to sit on the tatami mats on the platform next to the river. It was lovely and worth every penny. One of us was a bit slow getting down and back up again.

We walked around Kifune Shrine, then crossed the red bridge to pay our entry fee of 500 yen per person (around $3.30 USD each) at the booth. The fee included an English language brochure of the route that detailed the numbered sites that we would see, and help me answer the age old question “ARE WE THERE YET???” along the way when I was sweating my ass off.

There were also loaner walking sticks on offer at the entry booth. I hesitated to grab one but a domestic traveler who was just ending their hike recommended it so I went for it. Very good advice! As you can see, the stick doubles as a way to demand an end-of-hike ice cream from your partner to keep your motivation up.

The route started with a nearly consistent uphill climb of 573 m on a forest trail. It was very sweaty, although not as sweaty as our Fushimi Inari experience. Less mozzies, too.

At the Nishi-mon/Western Gate (site #40) we were able to sit for a break on a bench. The hike felt like much less of a slog after that since the climb was much more gradual from there to the highest site (#35), and there were more sites for our entertainment between #40 and the end of the route. The downhill to Kurama felt like a breeze. There’s a cable car option for part of that final descent (or ascent if you begin in Kurama), but we were happy to walk.

We really enjoyed this experience. Scott said it was his favorite part of our Kyoto trip thus far and I agreed. Here’s a massive photo dump of our hike. These are not in order… like, at all. I think they give a great idea of how much variety there is along this trail.

Kurama village was largely devoid of tourists when we arrived. We got that post-hike ice cream that always tastes so amazing.

Then we found this famous Tengu fellow at the Kurama train station before heading back to central Kyoto. My nose naturally veers left, so I tried his upward slope on for size.

Back in Kyoto we headed to the Furukawacho Shopping Street because it housed a restaurant recommendation from our Free Walking Tour guide. While we waited for the restaurant to open we wandered nearby and encountered Wire & Days just two doors down – a little boutique shop of handmade wire tchotchkes. We found a cute thank you gift for our friend/petsitter back home, and also purchased a “WELCOME” sign for ourselves. Lovely shop, and I’m a sucker for souvenirs that you can actually see being made at the same time! I learned later (due to unfortunate circumstances) that their shipping rates to the US are very reasonable, so I would even recommend purchasing online if you see something you like!

Alas the restaurant opened and we discovered yet again that our Free Walking Tour guide gives great recommendations. His favorite ramen spot: Gion Shirokawa Ramen. It was super tasty, and we got several items for about $18 USD.

We finished our evening a couple of blocks down at Beer Komachi with tasty pints in an all too familiar craft beer environment.

This was one of those perfect slow travel days. If we had only done the 2-3 nights in Kyoto like a lot of standard 2-week itineraries recommend, we would have missed out on this particularly awesome day.

Tuesday, July 16, 2024

We got a bit of late start and headed out at 10:45 am to walk the 1.4 miles from our hotel to Nishiki Market. Along the way we stopped into a shop and found a cute baby shower card for a friend and a small art piece to commemorate the festival that we planned to enjoy the next day. The shopping temptations are around every single corner, I swear.

We arrived to The Market…

…and quickly ducked into City Bakery to fuel up on coffees and pastries. Easy and tasty. On a less hot day I would recommend going out the back door and sitting in the courtyard area. (Not our photo.)

We enjoyed walking through the large and eclectic Market. In some ways it reminded me of our own famous market in Seattle.

Amongst the plethora of offerings we had sake, tempura, and craft beer. The craft beer was from Tango Kingdom Brewery and we enjoyed it at the back of Tango Table. Along with our beers they gave us a snack of these super tasty little fishes that I scarfed down very quickly. Scott had a rare moment of bravery to eat one from his bowl and hated every minute of it. I caught this event on video and will include it in a Japan compilation video that is forthcoming…

I had planned to sample many snacks today but for some reason I wasn’t particularly hungry. Maybe it was the heat. Leading up to the trip we watched several videos about this Market, and I thought I would be brave and eat one of the tiny octopus with a quail egg stuffed in its noggin. But during this trip I decided that I think I’m done eating octopus – not because they aren’t tasty, but because of my conscience (they’re too damn smart to be eaten by us stupid humans).

Exploring The Market also revealed the Nishiki Tenmangu Shrine where we each got amulets that we plan to attach to our packs during our pilgrimage trip next July. I selected Health and No Trouble. Very pragmatic.

My favorite stop in The Market (or maybe this little mall area isn’t considered part of The Market?) was B-Side Label – a sticker shop with hundreds (maybe thousands) of original designs by Japanese artists. There was a fun combo of stickers commemorating places we had/or would see on this trip along with some artistic and/or unhinged things. Here are a few of the ones I purchased as displayed in my journal.

When we were shopped out we walked the 1.5 miles to the Higashi Otani Cemetery. We love cemeteries and had learned about this one during our trip research. This place was epic. It was quiet and peaceful. It dates to the 17th century and has more than 15,000 graves.

Just above the cemetery is Kiyomizu-dera, a Buddhist temple popular for tourists to visit and a stark contrast to the peace and quiet in the cemetery.

Look at me insisting on a classic HILARIOUS tourist pose with Kyoto Tower.

We wandered down the adjacent shopping street, and had one of the popular pickled cucumbers on a stick (not fully pickled). Scott enjoyed, I thought it was overrated.

We caught a bus to Kyoto Station and found our way back into the food hall at Kyoto Tower Sando for a spot of dinner. Tempura for Scott and unagi for me.

On the walk back to our hotel we stopped in at Yebisu Bar for a couple of beers.

Saturday, July 13, 2024

I had pre-booked us into a Kyoto Free Walking Tour focused on the Gion District for 10:00 am. I’ve rarely been disappointed with a free walking tour and I like doing them on our first full day whenever we go somewhere new to get a lay of the land.

To get to our meeting point we used a Kyoto city bus and it was great. Per usual Google Maps gave us the details we needed to find our stop, get on the right bus, and know where to get off. We were able to easily use the Suica card we obtained in Tokyo to pay our fare.

The simple rules for bus travel in Japan that seem to differ from a lot of our American bus experiences were:

Don’t vandalize or litter at the bus stop. That’s rude, immature, and stupid.
Get on at the back door. You don’t have to wait for passengers to exit the bus because they aren’t getting off through that door. It’s called a system, people.
Shut up while you’re on the bus and make sure your electronics are silent, too. No one wants to hear you. However, if you’re a French or Chinese tourist in Kyoto this rule doesn’t seem to apply to you.
If you need to pay in cash and don’t have change, there’s a machine at the front of the bus to use. Because Japan implements things that just make sense.
Leave out of the front door. It’s that system, people.
Pay your freaking fare on the way out. It’s reasonable at only 230 yen/$1.50 USD. You don’t leave without paying because you understand you’re a capable and responsible member of society.

To be honest I’m not terribly bothered by bus usage in Seattle, and use it frequently during hockey season to get to our 1,000,000 home games. It’s the environmentally, socially, and fiscally responsible thing to do when you can even if sometimes you need to plug your nose or pretend you didn’t see something. But international travel often reminds me that Americans could really benefit from getting their shit together in just the smallest, most obvious ways.

We found our group at our meeting point at the edge of Gion at the statue of Izumo-no-Okuni (the founder of Kabuki Theater). The group had a nice international blend of tourists as has been our experience with other free walking tours in our travels. Scott enjoyed overhearing some German spoken during our tour, harkening back to memories of his dad.

Our guide was Swiss. Huh? He had been enjoying Japanese culture from afar for most of his life, including studying martial arts, and had been living in Kyoto for 18 months to further his studies. To be honest at first I was a bit disappointed we weren’t getting the inside scoop of a lifelong resident of Kyoto, but in the end I was happy to have this fellow Westerner’s perspective.

The walking tour started in the the geiko/maiko/teahouse area of Gion. Very quiet, clean, tranquil streets. Our guide had the opportunity to point out the real deal women vs. the tourists dressed up in costumes. He educated us on how young girls get started in the trade as apprentices (maiko), what their lives look like both early on and long term, and took a moment to help us question the morality of male behavior in teahouses. The traditional arts that these women produce is gorgeous and important. ~~But~~ And at the end of the day this is a highly misogynistic subculture of Japan, catering to only the most powerful and rich men in society. Unsurprising reports of maiko abuse are out there with a simple Google search.

We walked around the beautiful Kennin-ji Buddhist temple complex…

…and Yasaka Shrine with its iconic pagoda seen in every single tourist’s photo album (including ours of course).

We finished the tour in the shopping area of Gion. Crowded, of course. Delightful, of course. The reason that Japan is such a shopping temptation is that in an area like this in the other countries I’ve traveled to, the vast majority of shops would be selling silly souvenirs manufactured in China with maybe a couple of attractive local stores. In Japan this ratio is reversed and the shops are teeming with gorgeous little things that YOU NEED.

One thing to note is that Gion (as well as other places in Kyoto) is full of tourists dressed in kimono. It’s the perfect outfit for that photo memory with a religious and/or historic backdrop. You see people primarily of Asian descent doing this, but occasionally you see a whitey. This feels wrong to a liberal caucasian girl from America who has been taught about cultural appropriation. But I heard from multiple sources online and in-person while in Japan that Japanese people typically are not offended by seeing white people dressed in kimono and more often say that they take it as a compliment that we would want to do so. Does that mean I was about to do it and take photos and post them online? Um, no. Also, it was so fucking hot that I couldn’t begin to imagine tolerating all of those layers, much less walking in those wooden shoes for thousands of steps. To each their own.

Walking tour highly recommended. Fantastic itinerary, great insights (even from a non-local), and a taster of some great areas to go back to and spend more time. We also got bonus advice out of it from our guide who gave us his favorite ramen spot recommendation, as well as a way to enjoy Fushimi Inari with less crowds. Stay tuned…

We were ready for a spot of lunch so we quickly found Gion Tachinomi Yamaneko – a craft beer & izakaya place – close to where the tour ended. Comfy environment, A/C at the right temperature, lovely employees, good Wifi, yummy beers, a bunch of tasty snacks, left full and satisfied for $34.

The rest of the day we just did a lot of wandering. We went back to the shopping district to browse at our own pace. We had more snacks and drinks. We walked along the river. We took photos of random things.

I promise I’m having a good time – I think the sun was just in my face. Or maybe Scott was taking too long snapping the pic. We found coffees in a vending machine that said FIRE on them. #iykyk

It’s a ~~man~~ personhole cover. #cutejapaneseshit

A preview of something we are doing on the 17th.

One of just a handful of stamps I got on this trip. I might try harder on future trips.

A serene spot tucked below a busy intersection.

And to finish it off, a bunch of random photos from the day. If you look closely at the last photo you can see Kyoto Tower which was near to our hotel, and gives an idea of how much walking we did today.