Low key morning after the 29,000 step day Tuesday. Emily woke up in pain, unsurprisingly. Jordan was not feeling anything and I was great. I was dispatched to find food and coffee. I took a detour to the Hogashi Hongan-ji near our Airbnb that closed as we arrived on Monday to see if it would be worth bringing the gang later. Verdict: Very nice, but nothing special compared to some of the others we have on the itinerary. I did catch them with the inner sanctum open, which was very good.
One quirk about Japan is the availability of hot drinks in vending machines and convenience stores. Coffee and tea can be obtained, hot, in plastic bottles, black or pre-mixed with milk. It is supremely weird drinking a hot drink from a plastic bottle. It is much better poured into a mug, which is what Emily did when I brought it back. Bottled iced coffee is also available, and it is excellent (and 500ml for 150 Yen, so quite reasonable compared to Tim’s or such). In the konbinis, it is stored in an open cabinet like cold drinks are except… it’s hot.
At 11, we headed out to the Nijo Castle constructed in 1603 by Tokugowa Ieyasu, who was the first Shogun of the Edo Period. He is also the guy who the Shogun TV show is based on, which is a supremely excellent show. In fact, I overheard some American sounding 20 year old telling his buddy that this was the castle of the bad guys from the show. Which is not true for at least two reasons. One, that castle is explicitly in Osaka. Two, all of the plaques that he had just read repeatedly stated that the protagonist of the show is the one who built it after he was victorious in the war. Oh media literacy. I also helped them out because he wondered if it was filmed there (it was not. It was shot in Vancouver, because Vancouver can simultaneously be modern New York City and 17th century Japan). Emily was mildly (read: massively) rolling her eyes at me the whole time, but it could not be left unsaid!
Nijo castle itself was lovely, but freezing. We had to walk through the inside with no shoes and it was somehow more cold there than it was outside. They had one of the rooms set up with mannequins of what a meeting with the Shogun would be. Lots of duplication of rooms for different types of visits, even though they are all the same. Very cool murals of tigers, leopards, trees, birds and such on the walls. Fun fact: they used to think that tigers and leopards were the same species, and that every third cub of a tiger was a leopard. Couldn’t get any pictures inside, as they were forbidden (and we heard someone else getting told off for trying some sneaky pictures), but got a few of the grounds. This would be spectacular in the spring with the cherry blossoms, but was all a little brown for us in February.
We walked to a tiny little udon, soba and sushi shop that was staffed by two very old ladies. Had some great soup for the rainy and miserable day and Jordan expanded her sushi horizons to tuna rolls. Fresh wasabi made another appearance and it was excellent again. Going back to the faux wasabi paste is going to suck the next time I have it.
From there, it was off to take a 45 minute train and bus to the Karuma Onsen in the mountains. Probably the prettiest bus ride I have been on, as it followed the river up the mountain pass. Kyoto mountains are very pretty blanketed in cloud/fog, and the forest floor still had some snow.
The Onsen experience itself was pretty good, and amazing value. An outdoor hot spring bath, indoor hot spring bath, cold plunge pool and sauna, though the outdoor bath was very separated from the rest of it. It was the best bath individually, set in the tranquil, snowy forest, but there was not a cold plunge out there. Very small compared to something like Nordik Spa in Gatineau, but hot spring bath and sauna is exactly what we all needed for the rainy day after our very many steps the day before.
Jordan’s clothes were hilariously oversized, but she greatly enjoyed her first spa day. Japanese spas are separated by gender and are mandatory to be done nude, so I had some alone time while Emily had the pleasure of dealing with Jordan. She was actually very well behaved and enjoyed the experience. I was able to relieve Emily to do a proper thermal cycle to help with her back and legs. I made some friends with a Belgian firefighting crew who said that they invented the concept of Firefighter competitions and are now visiting Japan to participate in one next week. Very friendly group. They enjoyed practising their English and I tried to respond in French.
Coming back, we made a stop at… Wanna guess? Pokemon Center Kyoto! Mostly as a reward for Jordan being so well behaved at the spa, even though she had originally been hesitant about it. Also for the copious amount of public transportation taken on the trip so far. She opted to drain nearly the last of her budget to buy a Mewtwo stuffy to go with her Eevee one. Nana and Grandad gave her a bonus on the next call we had and topped up her budget by another 2,000 Yen that would carry her through the rest of the trip. This Pokemon Center probably had Emily’s favourite statue with Pikachu in a kimono, and I think she regretted getting the Sleeping Pikachu from Tokyo instead of a Kimono Pikachu from Kyoto.
We got some dinner at a Gyoza Dumpling place at the mall which was very tasty. I got an appetizer of octopus in wasabi which was legitimately delightful. Shockingly, Jordan and Emily declined to share that, so I got it all to myself. Huzzah. We ordered some fried chicken (very common in Japan for some reason, and it is boneless like a chicken wing), pork dumplings, chicken dumplings and perilla dumplings. What is perilla? Not sure! Emily’s google showed it is related to antacid and/or star anise, but she ate it despite her aversion to antacid flavoured things. We then stopped at the bakery for some chocolate tart and strawberry cake.
Back to the Airbnb it was. Picked up some whisky, strawberry plus peach drinks for Emily and breakfast stuff from the full-on grocery store in the subway station. The whisky is only okay, but the price was right at just 2,200 yen (about $22 CAD) for a full bottle. It says it is the smoky edition, and it is definitely more smoky than the classic Japanese whisky, but not far along the smoky scale.
All told, it was a great day. Onsen spa was a very good thing to relax during the otherwise very busy days we have had. Got super lucky with the connections which minimized standing in the rain.
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