Land of 200 Sundaes

Day 6: We had a restful sleep at our first night in Ryokan Nissho Besso and made a quick stop back to Kyoto station to make a new reservation for our Shinkansen train back to Tokyo the following day. Afterwards, we headed a few stops north to the Imperial Castle intent on seeing more of the amazing Kyoto history. We entered the castle grounds and found the information building closed, but kept our hopes up that the main castle would be open. A quiet stroll through the Mother and Child garden where we escaped the midday sun and sat listening to the crows, watching the birds and butterflies and refreshed with some water. We made our way to the south gate and main entrance of the castle, but it was locked. Sue and I, along with a few other visitors, took some photos in front of the gate and we employed our useful phrase for picture taking that we had learned the previous day at Nijo castle.

Despite the disappointment of not being able to enter the castle, we had a great time ambling enter the castle, we had a great time ambling through the gardens and castle grounds. There were several families out throwing baseballs around and taking in the natural surroundings. We found a small shrine with a bridge in the southwest corner of the castle grounds and spent some time there watching children feed the catfish, ducks, coy, and turtles. Trees were blooming and it was a truly peaceful location.

Afterwards, we walked the narrow streets south back towards our hotel area for some more afternoon shopping. We were excited to explore more in depth what these arcades had to offer. Needing some nourishment, we decided to take a walk on Karabawa street and passed ａｎ ice cream parlor with numerous parfaits displayed in the window. I had noticed this establishment (Karafuneya Coffee) the other day while searching for a phone card, and ｗａｓ happy to sample the selections. We were pleasantly greeted (as always) by the staff and provided with an English menu which we discovered contained 189 different sundaes; three of which had to be ordered 3 days in advance and cost 65, 85, and 100 dollars respectively. Sue and I ordered delicious parfaits that were brought out quickly and we hungrily dug in, foregoing and real food. We are seriously considering opening a franchise of this in Times Square....any partners???

Feeling fully refreshed we dove right in to Teramachi shopping arcade. We picked up hand rolled bean deserts fresh out of the oven (which we still don't know the name of). oven (which we still don't know　the name of). We found a clothing store where I picked up a couple more embroidered shirts (running total 9, although my count is 6 because 3 of 9, although my count is 6 because 3 of them are not Asia specific). Sue and I also picked up a couple gifts for people at this friendly establishment run by an attractive young man, who we found out is also a model. We wound our way through the various streets making heading towards Nishiki Market, which is the food district for the Kai Seiki chefs. We saw some of the items from our dinner at Hotel Nishiyama prominently displayed. There are items available for tasting along the way and the aromas and sights are a wonder to the senses. We sampled pickled foods and seaweed and purchased a shrimp and leek cake on a stick...sugoy!!!

Feeling a bit worn, we Ｈｅａｄｅｄ back to the Ryokan for an on sen. I made a trek around the hood for a sample of beers and came back with 4 for us to share. We each had a sweet and juicy plum that we purchased from Nishiki market and rested before our journey to Gion, the are of Kabuki and Geisha, later in the evening.

We took a pleasant walk in the Kyoto evening across a bridge over the river Kamo where we had dined the previous evening. There were many people about doing the same thing and a couple singing and playing guitar along the river side. We walked down the opposite of the river towards Shijo street to find it mostly closed and empty. Apparently we didn't learn our lesson from the previous night about heading out around 10pm. Our walk through Gion was uneventful and mostly desolate although we did find a nice street that ran alongside a canal. Hungry and tired, we went back to Karafuneya (our favorite sundaes restaurant) for some real food. Sue ordered a BLT and I had a salad. This time the order took a while, but we had a great time sitting and watching the women in their Yukatas and other locals. We laughed as the staff shouts out "Sei ma sei" when every new guest arrives to the restaurant. This phrase is somewhat translatable to "Do a good job".

Our evening ended with a short walk back to our room and watching some Olympic highlights and packing for our trip back to Tokyo the next morning. We truly loved Kyoto and highly recommend it as a must visit ｆｏｒ any travelers to Japan. One of my favorite cities I have ever visited.