Kyoto, Japan - 31st January 2023

Fushimi Inari- Taisha

The day began with us taking the Keihan Line train south to visit Fushimi Inari-Taisha shrine. A stunning place with torii or shrine gates creating surreal pathways up a wooded mountain side. The entire route covers about 4 kilometres and walkers pass many religious icons, in particular foxes, along the way.

The fox was a messenger of Inari, god of cereals, and are also just referred to as Inari. They often carry the key for the rice granary in their mouths.

The walk to the summit and back was a beautiful if tiring experience.

Sacred fox with the granary key.

Hike map.

Starting our pilgrimage.

Made it to the summit.

The plans for our return trip were somewhat thwarted by the broken down train and impressive number of workers standing around to admire it, which resulted in all trains being cancelled.

Before worrying about how to get home, we had another challenge. We had been tasked by our 'son-almost-in-law' Daf, to seek out a shop selling vintage gaming items and purchase a particular gadget. This proved to be a challenge with our non-existent knowledge of such things and the language barrier but we did eventually leave as satisfied customers.

Working out where we could take a bus to bring us to the underground train, we stopped at the convenience store for our now customary lunch of onigiri, a triangle of rice with a protein filling, wrapped in a sheet of seaweed and hot tea in a bottle. Eating lunch passed the time while waiting over an hour for the bus and chatting with friendly passers-by.

Surrounded by gaming relics.

Glamorous lunch break at the bus stop.

The bus finally showed up and took us to the underground station. Obviously school was finished for the day by then and we were amazed to see very young primary school children competently making their own way home on their own on the underground, smartly dressed in uniform and the standard school back back.

The underground train dropped us in Kyoto's main shopping street and we strolled home, stopping at the supermarket for our daily pleasure of wandering around enjoying the food artistry while selecting that night's dinner.

Seemingly tiny tots navigating the underground alone.

Llama drama in the main shopping drag.