Travel Blog: Nara / Return of Yakitori

Woke up today and headed over to Kyoto station to eat at one of the many bakery options. Got myself an ice coffee, croissant, and a little blueberry danish! Hilary stayed in the hotel to rest up a bit. After breakfast we decided to go to Nara, the old old (Kyoto is the old capital, Nara gets two old's) of Japan, about an hour away by train. We've gotten great millage out of these JR passes; they pretty much let us on all the JR trains here throughout the country.

We took "Rapid" train to Nara and after getting a little oriented with the directions, we headed up the long path to Nara Koen (Nara Park) As with before, there are no shortage of cute restaurants and snack shops along the way. On the way to the park, we checked out a few of the temples; one of them was next to the second largest pagoda in Japan, dating back to 728.

The entrance to the park was marked by a large red tori gate which we passed through. The area is surrounded by tall trees with thick trunks and deer roaming about. A few of the deer looked like they were engaged in some kind of dispute and were butting each others heads. They had an audience including both humans and other deer onlookers. We walked up the path a little more toward a shrine where Hilary got her fortune. The way it works is you pick one out of three boxes containing sticks. You then shake that box, and take out one of the sticks which has a number on the bottom. You hand the number to the priest and she gives you a paper telling you your fortune. It wasn't what she expected, but hey, is it ever?!

We walked a little more, and were getting pretty hungry at that point, so headed back to the town and stopped by a little sandwich shop. We ordered an egg and cheese sandwich and two smoothies. It took a long while for the food to come, but it was so worth it. The bread was so fresh, and perfectly pressed like a panini. I got a kiwi apple smoothie and Hilary got an avocado banana smoothie. Oishii desu!

We made our way back to Kyoto and Hilary checked out some clothing shops while I rode the escalator up and down taking geometrically interesting photos. On the way back to the hotel, we passed by a live theater performance of what I think was a kabuki play. There were three Japanese dancers moving in unison wearing demonic masks, moving to drums, chanting and a flute. Very cool indeed.

After relaxing at the hotel for a bit, we headed out to find that amazing Yakitori spot we ate at last time around. We had a little mix up with the train getting their and were worried they wouldn't hold our reservation. Fortunately when we got there, they were happily waiting for us. We pretty much repeated the menu we had before; the delicious salad with the ume (plum) dressing, grilled vegetables (lotus with sea urchin, eggplant, shishito peppers, and scallion), and yakitori (grilled chicken on skewers or a coal fire. The perfect food to go with sake!