Good day, my lovelies. I welcome you back to the wonderful world of four months ago. Location: Kyoto, Japan. Destination: Kurama. But more on that later.

We started our third day in Kyoto with another amaze-tactic breakfast.

I really gotta figure out how to make these breakfasts happen at home, but I think I’d need a small army to do all the grocery shopping, prepping, and cooking.

Our plan for this day was to take the train to a village called Kibune, hang out for a while, and then take a short hike to the neighboring village, Kurama, for a little hot spring soak. After breakfast, Matt and Cassie announced they would stay behind because of Matt’s leg. The rest of us went upstairs to get our things, but Lea came to our door to announce that she and Remy had decided they also wanted a little away-from-group time. This meant the day would belong to me and Katie. No problem, there, though! We make a great romantic travel couple, haha.

The train into Kibune is famous for its beautiful colors. So famous, in fact, that half the seats were set up in “theater mode,” so that they faced directly out the windows instead of towards the front or back of the train! The two best times of the year for the colors are the fall and the spring. Luckily, we came right in the middle of the “spring new growth” season, and as we zoomed along through the Maple Tunnel, we were bombarded with some of the brightest greens I’ve ever seen.

The train dropped us off at the bottom of a mountain, and we had to walk up the rest of the way to the main street of the village. This village is famous for its river. During the summer months, restaurants build platforms over the top of the river and serve all of their meals right there! This is a clever (and wonderful) way to keep cool in the heat of the summer. Unfortunately, the official season for this runs from June until August, and we were here in mid-May. We could see some platforms being built and were super bummed about our timing.

But as we continued to follow the river up the main street, I noticed one of the platforms seemed to have mats and pillows set up. I practically yell-whispered in my excitement: “Katie!!!! I think that one is open!!!” We cautiously went up to check, and sure enough, they had just opened for lunch! We were the first ones there, so we got to pick the best table, right on the edge of the platform.

We were immediately served tea, and I cannot tell you how giddy we were with excitement. It felt like we’d won the lottery when it wasn’t even lottery season. (Lol. I have no idea how the lottery works.)

  

Soon, the waitress brought out our trays of food. It was a set menu, so we really didn’t know what we were in for. The tray contained some small fried fishies, some indecipherable yellow blocks (these turned out to be egg), cold noodles, a raw fish dish, another unidentifiable cube, and some boiling soup with tofu. Luckily, Katie asked first, in a hushed whisper, “How do you think we’re supposed to eat this?” Hahaha. I was about to ask the same thing.

Katie then supplied: “If I were to guess, I would say we should put the tofu into one of these (she gestures to the cube and the raw fish bowl), and then we add the soup to the bowl.” I agreed that this seemed to be a fair assessment.

THANKFULLY, the waitress returned before we could act, with a second tray for each of us containing rice, miso soup, toppings, and a flavored oil/ soup. She then instructed us to put the tofu into the flavored oil, and the boiling water could be left alone, as it was just to keep the tofu warm.

Goodness, I can’t tell you how badly I wish she would have come up to us as we were pouring this boiling water into the bowl of raw fish. Bahahahahaha.

As we started eating, we swapped places so that I could get a view of the beautiful platforms and Katie could get a view of the water.

      

The food was sooooooooooooo good! Ugh. Seriously! Take me back! Take me back right now!

After this delightful, delicious, magical experience, we finally continued on our journey to explore the Kifune Temple.

We walked all along the river and peeked into the other platform restaurants that were being set up. A couple others were also open for business, farther along the road. (I think ours was the best, though they all seemed completely divine.)

    

 

   

 

This whole village was built right on this river, too. It didn’t seem like there were any other streets!

After we made it to the top of the street, we wound our way back down to the trail head to make our way to Kurama. The green was otherworldly.

 

    

Part of the hike is famous for the tangled cedar tree roots that swarm the path.

At the top of the mountain between the two villages sits Kurama-dera Temple, a sprawling space with breathtaking views and so much sunshine.

So much sunshine, in fact, that I had trouble keeping my eyes open. Tehehehe.

Though the ascent was much like a familiar trail hike, the descent from the temple was made up of dozens of zigzagging staircases. Thank goodness we didn’t go the other direction!

Katie really liked how dilapidated this temple building was:

Soon enough, we reached Kurama, another tiny village. This one was not centered around a river, but it was small and quaint, just the same. Our main order of business here was to hit up the onsen, so we did just that!

    

Japanese onsens are nude-only; no swimsuits allowed! Therefore, we obviously didn’t get any pictures. Men and women are split up, and visitors must undress and shower off with soap before entering the hot spring. This one was outside and it was so beautiful! The sun was shining through the leaves around us and the water was oh-so warm. I liked that this one was small because it was so peaceful. I almost fell asleep!

But all good things must come to an end, and it was pretty toasty in that water after a while, so we rinsed off, got dressed, took a picture with Kurama’s mascot, and hopped the train back to Kyoto! A wonderful excursion to these two lovely villages.

We celebrated with an ice cream waffle. Yum.

We tried to make it over to the Golden Pavilion on the other side of town, but by the time we got there, it was already closed. Darn these shrines and temples that close at four and five o’clock! Luckily, we were super close to a sushi place, so we walked on over there and grabbed a table.

I’ve never been to a conveyor belt sushi restaurant, and it turned out this was definitely the place to try it out! It was so fun to grab whatever looked yummy, and each plate had at least two bites so that we could both try everything. I think my favorite was the crab, but we must have tried at least eight different dishes. And for dessert, we got a taiyaki (a doughy fish filled with red bean paste) and some match shaved ice. Yum! 

Each table also had a make-your-own matcha station coming right out of the wall! You just grabbed a cup from above the table, added a couple tiny spoonfuls of matcha powder, and add hot water from the spout! Voila! I think Katie legitimately had five cups. She has a problem. Bahahaha.

Quite possibly the best part of our sushi meal was that the whole thing came to about seven dollars per person! Craziness!

Full, dizzy with the memories of our magical day in our heads, and completely wiped out, we finally headed back to our hostel to play some cards with the rest of the gang before hitting the hay.

A wonderful day, indeed. Until next time,

私はあなたに最高を祈ります/ best wishes,

-Lizzy-wa