Kiyomizu & Gion area, Kyoto Japan

Day 4 of 9-day trip to Japan

Today was a big exploration of a famous big temple (Kiyomizu-dera) and the surrounding area of small backstreets, shops, coffee and snack places, canals, and finishing with a teppanyaki experience.

We took an early bus to the area of a huge, hillside temple called Kiyomizu-dera. Spoiler alert: the grounds were open but the actual temple on the mountain side on massive struts was closed for restoration work.

Arriving in the area saw we were not alone; lots of people, so obviously a popular tourist spot. The walk up to the temple was interesting; so many quaint wooden shops and refreshment areas. Yes, a tourist trap, but I didn’t care! There were lots of place to grab street food and sit on the upper floors.

In the temple complex were lots of buildings, all with different temple functions. There was of course lots of Autumn foliage, and pagodas and women wearing traditional Japanese dresses (also probably tourists).

We stumbled across a massive cemetery too, a huge sombre place, very different to what you’d find in the UK.

After leaving the complex, we headed north and wandered the streets going down hill, again lined with the picturesque wooden buildings of the area. There were other small temples and pagodas around, secretive looking narrow allies, and of course, a thousand places to stop and eat.

We stopped at a place called Inoda which had a little garden at the back looking onto another tourist spot. I had lemon meringue pie…old skool treats!

At the back of Inoda Coffee was a courtyard of sorts, nothing to do with the coffee house. There were a group of older wooden buildings which led to Seiryu-en(?), a place with a garden with a giant-carp-filled pond surrounded by beautiful Autumn trees.

When we had finished, we kept walking west to another area and near a canal and got a snack and coffee and decided what to do or dinner.

Again, so many choices = walking too long! We stopped at Teppanyaki Manryu because it had English menus outside and got a place at the counter, the best place to sit at a grill place like this. We had grilled shrimp, noodles, and okonomiyaki (the thick Japanese savoury pancake), and a few glasses of sake in the overflowing trays.