itshalfempty

Japan was pretty high on my bucket list. It was an easy inclusion for both of us into our travel plans for the year, though much harder was deciding on what our itinerary would be. There are a ton of things to do in Japan, much of which is pretty different from what we’re used to experiencing in the West, and two weeks is not a ton of time.

We spent quite a bit of time trying to pin down an itinerary. There’s always the tension between seeing a little of a lot of places, versus staying longer in one location and seeing more. We ended up deciding to spend about a week in Tokyo and about a week in Kyoto, with an day in Nikko in between. That would give us the flexibility to take some day trips from either Tokyo or Nikko if we wanted to explore. In the end, we didn’t end up taking any day trips, so I guess we ended up with a pretty decent itinerary.

Tokyo

Our time in Tokyo was spent exploring different neighborhoods. We took the subway quite a bit, but we also just walked a ton. Since we weren’t on a strict time crunch, we generally picked a couple of destinations that were somehwat close together, took the train to get close to one, then walked around the city to get from point to point.

There was surprisingly a lot of greenspace in Tokyo. We visited quite a few large gardens, which were both peaceful and a welcome respite from the crowds.

For the most part, the weather was fairly pleasant. However, it was pretty rainy one day in Tokyo and we decided to spend it indoors at the Tokyo National Museum. The museum was interesting, but as someone without a lot of knowledge about the history of Japan, I was missing a lot of context to really understand what was on display. Many items were marked as culturally significant, and many were marked with placards saying “no photos.”

One of the highlights of our visit was seeing a restored collection of sculptures on special display. The lighting was dark and photos were strictly forbidden. According to the description on the museum website, these statues are usually not viewable by the public, and this is the first time they have been exhibited outside of their home temple in over 60 years.

The Imperial Palace grounds were really cool. Unfortunately we didn’t get to tour the palace, but walking the publicly accessible areas with castle buildings flanked by tall skyscrapers is pretty surreal.

Nikko

Nikko is a small mountain town, serving as the gateway to a national forest and a fairly large temple complex. It’s a really popular tourist spot - both for Japanese tourists and foreign tourists. While it’s not uncommon for people to take a day trip to Nikko, we decided to spend a full day there exploring the temples.

Kyoto

Kyoto was a mad house. I knew it was going to be touristy, but I was completely unprepared for just how bad it was going to be. To be fair, we visiting the city just as the leaves were really starting to turn colors for the fall. But all of the attractions were really crowded with tourists trying to get their photos (and I say that acknowledging I was part of the problem), which I personally find to be a big turn-off.

I really enjoyed large parts of the city, but I was very much beyond my tourist tolerance at all of the “main” attractions.

One of our first stops in Kyoto was Maruyama Park, which was really lovely. Lots of folks were out just enjoying the park and the weather.

The Rokuon-ji Kinkaku, or the Golden Pavillion, was the first of the “big” attractions we visited. It was cool, but was it worth the price of admission, the slow shuffle in the loop around the pavillion, and fighting the crowd to snag a couple of photos? I don’t think so.

It was pretty, and it was a gorgeous day. So I guess there’s that!

Our next and final visit to the “main” attractions was Senbon Torii. It’s the well-known shrine with thousands of Torii gates. Maybe it was a bit of travel fatigue setting in, but I was completely over people after this shrine. The travel tips online are to show up at the crack of dawn to get here before the crowds, and I can now echo that suggestion. By the time we got there, the crowds were pretty thick. Not only was it slow moving up the slope through the gates, but it was pretty much impossible to get any photos without anyone else in them.

We did ultimately spent quite a lot of time walking around Gion to shop and soak in the old city vibes. While a lot of the area felt very manufactured for tourists, there were some cool shops throughout.