The Japan experience week trip continued on with our first full day of adventures. After breakfast at the hotel, we moved onto the Kiyomizu temple, a UNESCO world heritage site that overlooks the city of Kyoto. While at the temple, students had an opportunity to take pictures of the amazing Shinto shrine and the cityscape below, explore the pitch black bowels of one of the temple undergrounds, and discover some wonderful Japanese handicraft and gifts in the shops lining down the narrow streets back to where our bus was.

From there, we were whisked off to the Kyoto Fine Arts Museum to check out some of the traditional and more contemporary paintings, some of which were painted by artists not much older than our own students! After a quick walkthrough, it was time for lunch with an authentic Japanese feel to it. Back in downtown Kyoto, the group sat down to a Bento box style lunch with a side of a seafood soup.

In the afternoon, we first headed off to Arashiyama and the bamboo forest. We took a leisurely walk through the grounds of the early Japanese imperial courtyards, home to Japanese royalty while Japan’s capital was still in Kyoto. Ducking into the massive, shaded canopy of giant bamboo “trees”, we enjoyed a brief look at Japan’s peaceful natural landscape that were just showing the hints of the upcoming Sakura (cherry) blossom season. This walk led right back into Arashiyama’s village streets. Here we gave time for all the students to freely explore the shops and restaurants that lined the streets of Arashiyama’s quaint village. Many souvenirs were bought and many ice cream cones were consumed!

From Arashiyama, we moved onto another world-renowned shrine in Kyoto called Fushimi Inari Shrine, up the slopes of Mount Inari. Lining the path up the hill, are “ten-thousand” Inari gates, bright orange Shinto structures that are synonymous with the Shinto religion, seen widely throughout Japan. What makes this site remarkable was the sheer number and density of all the gates at this site, forming tightly grouped clusters of Inari gates.

After hitting up different attraction sites non-stop, the group was tired and ready for dinner. This point also marked the last stop before we moved out of Kyoto and down the road to Osaka, one of Japan’s largest cities. When we arrived in Osaka, we went straight to a shabu shabu (hot pot style) restaurant. The students didn’t need to be told twice to eat, as they hungrily cooked up their raw meats and veggies. Once those were gone, some went for a second or third round while others went for a “healthy” helping of ice cream and other desserts (for some of whom, it was also their third helping of ice cream today).

So finally, our day has concluded with our arrival at the New Otani Hotel, a 5-star guesthouse. We’ll be in Osaka all day tomorrow to check out the attractions in this busy metropolis.