Nijo-jo was open this day so it was a chance to check out the former residence of Tokugawa Ieyasu.
Even though this was a flatland castle, according to wikipedia, "the surface area of the castle is 275,000 square meters, of which 8000 square meters is occupied by buildings" so there was much walking to be done to try and see everything.
Unfortunately, this was another place that did not allow photography or any kind within the building but the sheer scale of this place is kind of overwhelming! From the outer areas with the uguisubari and menacing murals all the way to the Shogun's inner chambers, the work that must have gone into building this place must have been immense. Not only that, but this was only a part time residence!
In addition to the amazing castle buildings, there is a breathtaking garden that could be an attraction on it's own!
Here's the moat!
Then it was a short trip over to Kyoto-eki for lunch. Unfortunately, the good food court is at the top of a stairway that seems to go into the clouds. This piece of archetectural madness doesn't even start until you get to the 3rd (or was it 4th) floor.
Allegedly, this is a stage meant for performances. I doubt it is popular with unicyclists, martial artists or acrobats.
At the very top of all the stairs and escalators is the Happy Terrace.
It was okay.
Settled on some Hakata ramen, but wasn't paying attention so I ended up with hiya-ramen (cold ramen) which reminded me a lot of nyengmyun due to the extra chewy consistency of the noodles.
Next was Sanjusangendo, the longest wooden building in the world and home to 1,001 statues of Kannon, all painstakingly carved out of wood. In addition to that, there are 28 other Buddhist deities as well as Fujin and Raijin statues in this building.
As with Toji-ji, there was no photography allowed in the building.
The finale for the day was Kiyomizu-dera. I had been here in 2008, right before New Year's so I had an idea what to expect, but was kind of let down by the sections that were closed down for repair.
This time I didn't walk all the way up the hill from the bottom, but it cannot be ignored that this is a temple built on top of a mountain and there are many steep staircases that wind throughout the buildings.
An attempt at the popular shot most people take when they go to Kiyomizu-dera. Hopefully, one day I'll get to come here when there are cherry blossoms or the fall colors.
One of the main attractions at Kiyomizu-dera is the water. Kiyomizu-dera translates to 'clear water temple' and there are three channels of water from which visitors can drink from.
Seems that the three different streams of water represent health, wisdom and longevity and that if one drinks all three they will suffer misfortune for being greedy. Not sure which one was which but I drank from the middle one.
Even with all the hundreds of people drinking the water every day, it looks like a modern precaution was added, especially after the SARS, and H1N1 scares.
The shopping area on the hill below Kiyomizu-dera was a zoo! Unable to resist the strangeness of it, I went and decided to have a 'pizza hot dog crepe'. It wasn't bad, but not something I'd want to eat often either.
The streets were shut down near the hotel and there were food booths set up in the alleyways and along the sidewalks!
As far as I can remember, I had some karaage, hashimaki, horumon stir fry and....? Kyoto kuiadore!
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