Got about 2 hours of sleep which was expected due to the jet lag. I was kind of surprised there were several izakayas around that closed at 5am but I didn’t want to deal with translating the menu so we settled on the always reliable 7-11.
The plan for this trip was to leave Minneapolis on Thursday 3/6 and come back home on Monday 3/24. Joanna normally has Tuesdays off so she could use that day to recoup from jet lag. I was so excited to go on this trip that I checked in the moment I got the 24hr heads up email on Wednesday morning.
2024 was a travel drought year. It was year full of good things but we just had so much going on we couldn’t afford the time or the money to do one of the typical trips we usually do.
This is always the hardest post to write because I have to acknowledge that the trip is over and piling responsibilities back home take over. The night before was our last meal in Japan. Joanna said let’s close it out with a bang and get Okonomiyaki one last time.
I just did the math, of the days we’ve been on this trip we’ve averaged 14,600 steps per day. The most we walked was 26,024 steps when we went to the bamboo forest on June 5th. At this point of the trip our feet were tiiireed. However, it was the last full day for the trip so we had to make it count.
Generally this entire trip has been pretty freeform where we didn’t have any where specific to be at any given time. Today was a bit more structured as I bought us tickets to the Osaka aquarium for 11am a little bit more than a week ago and dinner reservations at Kani Doraku at 5:30pm, the restaurant with the giant crab on the front.
I think 2 nights in a ryokan is a perfect amount of time to relax and forget about the world outside you. We started packing up because the morning tends to be a little rushed with breakfast at 8 and check out at 10. The nakai san knocked on our door to let us know that breakfast was ready for us.
Yesterday was an awesome experience of just eating delicious food and soaking in the onsen so why wouldn’t we do it all over again today?! The first time we did a ryokan experience it was just for one night. We arrived later in the afternoon and it felt like we were rushed through the entire time we were there and didn’t get a chance to explore other areas of the town.
It’s moving day again! I feel like every time I leave a city and I want to stay longer, it means that we had a good time and there’s reason to come back in the future. Check out was at 11 and check in at the Morizuya Ryokan in Kinosaki Onsen was at 3. In looking at Google maps, if we left right at check out and caught the train out of Kyoto, we’ll arrive an hour before check in so we had some wiggle room.
The plan this morning was to head to the Fushimi Inari shrine to see the 10,000 torii gates just south of Kyoto. We got up at 6am hoping to beat the crowds to get some pics without bumping into people but along the way we went to the wrong subway station, got on the wrong train which missed our stop, then had to back track on another train. We probably used up an extra 45 min trying to get to Ryukokudai-mae-fukakusa Station. Fortunately we saw other tourists with the same problems as us so it definitely wasn’t my poor navigation skills.
