October 01, 2005
Nope, no luck.
No luck getting back to sleep, so I guess I'll just continue!
Last Friday we went to Kyoto for the last time. It was really nice to just go and relax. We really only had one goal while we were there - to go out and see the bamboo forest out in Sagano.
We took the Shinkansen to Kyoto, and met my friend from Osaka. We hung out with her for an hour or so and just talked outside of Kyoto Station. She had to work, though, so we parted company and hopped on the local train to Saga-Arashiyama.
Sagano is outside of the city center of Kyoto, and is quite rural by Japanese standards (and maybe even by Western ones). Not so exciting, really, but very pretty with all of its greenery and quaint houses. The bamboo forest is about 10 minutes from the train station on foot. Unfortunately, Friday was a National Holiday so it was much busier and more crowded than usual - but the trains were on a less-frequent holiday schedule. We made our way to the bamboo forest and in to look around.
The Bamboo Forest is very beautiful and very quiet. It's very different from anywhere else I've seen in Japan. Though like most Japanese parks/natural areas, the actual "nature" is fenced off and your only option is to walk on the path with all of the other sightseers. So unfortunately, I didn't get to actually walk among the trees. But still, I enjoyed the forest a lot.
Also in this area was Nonomiya shrine.
The rest of the Kyoto pics from this trip are here.
Packing up the apartment took the vast majority of the remainder of our time at home. It's amazing how much we accumulated, and also amazing how much we ended up being able to fit in our leetle suitcases.
Posted by Aimee at October 1, 2005 10:00 PM