9 - Kyoto and Inari

9 - Kyoto and Inari

5:20 AM wake up, on the train to Fushimi Inari starting to dodge the crowds at the start and get a good end time

We are off

Gates and torii and more gates

Shrine guardian

Breakfast at a vantage point

Back on the road

Now the way down on the other (not the tourist side)

Briefly cutting through town

I love that even tiny houses have style and cool trees

We keep going

Crossing a highway

Short break, also did see this earlier (much earlier) but the site it links to shows no reports

Current progress

Higashiyama Peak Park

With a view

It's giving Kinlochleven in the West Highland Way's final stretch winding down the mountain vibes

Down down down

Chionin Temple pitstop

Pitstop over

Back through the city for a bit, bye Chionin

Last bit of city before we start our next and longest ascent

Daimonji Ascent start

Chicken guardians

The road up was rough on tired feet

Didn't make many posts on the way up or down as I needed to focus but we are done, recap time

The up was a different kind of climb than we get in Ontario and some of the up/down stretches had some treacherous down sections that we bumbles through on all fours on our backs to be safe... Then we see people jogging the trail like how ...

We were finally rewarded with the summit, we at down had some energy bars and water and then it was time to go down, I was terrified it would be the same kind of descent as we climbed because while it was exhausting going up it would have been terrifying going down

A short walk down was a nicer vantage even if it was lower, descent to it was much simpler

There were a lot more stairs and more maintained

There were a lot more stairs and more maintained paths, it's clearly the main path for people as it was a lot busier in both directions, opposite to Fushimi Inari where the first part is the easier more maintained one and the other direction is wilder

Which honestly, thank Inari because it was a lot since we hadn't been moving as much due to winter... There was a point where most people were going in a different direction and we followed for a sec before realizing it wasn't the path we had on Alltrails...

Maybe we should have gone with them but it wasn't clear how long that path was so we doubled back, the final 20 mins were a bit less maintained and one section had a rope set up to make going to a little (a lot) easier, life savers the people that put it up... But then civilization and the end

And finally done, 240 floors according to the phone and 30k steps before 1pm!

Taku Sando katsu sandwich lunch, hunger is the best spice but they are good

Now shower and soak

Have just been vegging out, it's a vacation, no need to jam pack... Tomorrow is the onsen town full relax day though before the denouement in Tokyo

Soft serve at a honey place, they let us try various honeys with it

Wanted to look at the Kyoto National Gardens but the best parts seem to be imperial preserves or something and are only open part of the day so we mostly just walked on gravel

Park guardian

On the way out randomly saw this small bridge and pond which was really pretty, too bad we couldn't see the gated areas

Then some hole in the wall-y ramen and gyoza and we are ready to crash early, very long day... 40k steps tho!