Apres Tour

Fortunately our first two days after the tour were kindly planned out by Leina so we just had to follow directions. According to our itinerary, we were supposed to spend the morning at the Itsukushrina shrine. We took a train to the Mr. Miyagi station (OK, not the real name but it was a useful mnemonic device). And from there we headed boarded a quick ferry to the Miyajima island.

I thought it would be a good idea to start by taking the ropeway to the peak of the island and then make our way down. I was wrong. It turns out that it takes a couple days to recover from six consecutive days of snowboarding, and I wasn't recovered. Neither was Dan but we struggled through the uneven, up and down path back to the shrine.

Unfortunately, during our hike, the tide went out so the famous floating shrine was actually sitting just above muddy sludge. I assume this took away some of the magic of the site, but it was still interesting. And the gate to the shrine remained awe inspiring in the water further out.

We spent the afternoon at the Peace Memorial in Hiroshima. I'm not sure I will ever fully recover from this. Every picture, every video, every description of the destruction is burned in my heart and mind. It is unbelievable that there were any survivors at all. If anyone is planning a trip to Japan, this is worthy of a visit. You may want to bring tissues.

In the evening, we found out way to Kyoto. With all the platforms and trains coming and going we were excited to find the right train. Of course, it only took five minutes into the ride to realize that we were wrong about this. The train, was going to stop in Kyoto, but was also not one covered by our Japan rail passes. Fortunately, the conductor was very nice and helped us figure out how to get to there. We got off at the next stop and then had to make one more connection but we did eventually make it.

I loved Kyoto on my previous visit to Japan and was super excited to revisit the city. We booked an all day tour to check out the sites. Our first stop was to the Nijo Castle. I remembered this place because of the squeaky floors that prevented unwanted visitors from sneaking in. Whenever we arrived, we were the only your bus and had the entire grounds to ourselves. With the unusual snowy weather, the gardens and grounds were amazing.

The next stop on the tour was my favorite place from my last visit, the Golden Pavilion. I was super excited to see it covered with snow. Unfortunately, so was everyone else in the entire city. It was a wall of visitors with umbrellas threatening to poke out eyes out. Our tour guide wasn't able to penetrate the masses to even get near the ticket counter. As a result, we had to leave on order to continue the tour. Needless to say, I was super disappointed.

The rest of the tour consisted of a few more Buddhist temples and Shinto shrines. All made more interesting due to the dry humor and comic running of our awesome you guide, Makiko. She definitely kept us laughing throughout the day which almost made up for the super disappointment of missing the Golden Pavilion.