We wake up to Pokémon again! It’s our last morning in Kyoto, and it seems like the breakfast restaurants we want to visit are either doubling as churches (!), allow smoking inside but not children (!!), or open way too late for our early morning crew. We ask at the hotel front desk, and set off towards their suggestion, only to find that it’s a hotel restaurant, and today they have a sign out saying all their tables are reserved for hotel guests. Luckily, Café Veloce is right across the street, and we head there instead. Their morning sets were three options of breakfast sandwiches, with hot or iced coffee or tea. The girls got their juices, and we all tolerated our sandwiches. No pictures, no rave reviews.
I thought it would be nice to head back to the Nishiki market without the extreme heat and overwhelming crowds from Tuesday afternoon, and instead we got a mostly closed market, fish vendor stalls just opening, and a bakery. So of course I had to buy some treats for our train ride at the bakery! The Earl Grey and dark chocolate biscuit was delicious, the matcha macadamia cookie even more so, and the berry scone our least favourite, too dry and crumbly.
We turned around when it got too hot, and headed back to the hotel for one last Snorlax hug and then check out. The front desk staff called us a taxi, and we headed for Kyoto Station. We had so much time to spare, so Téa and I went browsing, although all the shops seemed to be 98% souvenirs and gifts, and only 2% travel supplies like food and beverages. We grabbed some juice, water and tea, and a couple of onigiri, salmon stuffed rice balls wrapped in seaweed. The perfect train snack!
The bullet train from Kyoto to Osaka takes a whopping 12 minutes, station to station. Once in Osaka, we lugged all our bags to the subway, and after another transfer and about 45 minutes, we ended up as close as we could get to our new home away from home. We hopped in a taxi, and then WE ARE FINALLY HERE!
Our new abode is an old wooden traditional Japanese home. Upstairs has two bedrooms, and the floors are covered in tatami mats. We have thin mattresses on the floor for the four of us, and there is no other furniture. There is plenty of closet space though, and I can’t wait for tomorrow when we’ll be able to properly unpacked. Downstairs has a toilet, a sink and washing machine room, and a shower and bathtub room, a small livingroom and a small kitchen, with at least room for a proper table and four chairs.
As much as I long for the sleek and pristine modern Tokyo apartment, we were living on top of eachother 24/7, except for in the washroom or shower. Here, we have two bedrooms and really feel like there is some space. Much better for the long term stay we’re in for.
Our street is so quaint! These tiny houses are wall to wall to wall to wall, and we’re in a cul de sac, although that term sounds way too roomy for this little street. I’ll try to count the houses tomorrow. We’ve walked around a little bit, found our closest two vending machines (because you never know when you get a craving for iced coffee, need a sports drink, or feel like trying corn soup in a bottle), there’s a 7Eleven 3 minutes away, and an awesome grocery store 6 minutes away.
Anyways, back to our arrival. We dumped our bags, half way unpacked, and set off to find some lunch. By now it was almost 3pm! We also needed to find out where our two suitcases had been dropped off, as we had very conflicting information from dropping it off at 7Eleven, what the online account said, and what our luggage tracker said… But first, lunch!
From our little street, we turn left onto a slightly larger road. This road seems to have some industrial looking businesses, but also private homes and restaurants. Down by the main road we turn right, and immediately have three great restaurant options, not even 10 minutes walk away. Today, we chose conveyor belt sushi, because we had such a great time at the one in Tokyo.
Immediately upon entering, you enter number of people into a machine, and you get a slip of paper with your table number on it. On the table there was a hot water tap, chopsticks and toothpicks, wasabi, pickled ginger and a sweet sauce, green tea, furikake and no less than 5 different soy sauces. Above the conveyor belts (yes, two floors of belts), we found cups for tea, tiny spoons and forks, and wetnaps. Everything we needed, in other words!
Both girls chose kids sets, which came with a bowl of mild ramen, a small order of French fries, and a drink. The only thing delivered to us not via conveyor belt today, was the kids’ drinks. When the nice non-English speaking server came to drop the drinks off, she also brought restaurant branded coins that the girls could use in the gachapon machines at the entrance (where they got restaurant branded trinkets, of course). The girls were so excited!
Joe and I started with fatty tuna, continued with trios of salmon (oh my, that smoky char on the “rare steak” salmon!), seared sea bream, scallops, eel… I couldn’t even list them all, we had so much good sushi! The girls had colourful dango for dessert, this time they were red bean filled mochi balls on a skewer, and I had vanilla ice cream. The milk in Japan is just a cut above, I don’t even use cows milk at home, and thus the ice cream is next level as well. Even vanilla is delicious, albeit not quite the same as sweet potato…
That slip of paper that told us which table to go to, then becomes your ticket to pay with. Scan the QR code on the ticket at the front, and pay at the machine. Everything in Japan is a QR code, by the way, even paying your taxi driver!
Next came our hunt for the suitcases. We weren’t quite sure where they were, but we followed my AirTag info, and aimed for that. We walked about 20 minutes, it was hot with very dark and scary clouds looming. According to my weather app, it was supposed to rain all day, and we hadn’t seen a drop yet, so I guess it was just there to remind us to hurry? We were finally reunited with our luggage, and could return to our AirBnb, once again with all our belongings under the same roof.
While Joe tested the shower room, the girls and I headed for the grocery store. We could finally purchase something larger than a palm sized olive oil! I could have spent another hour browsing the shelves here, and the selection of ready to eat or ready to heat meals is just impressive. We bought some necessities and a lot of treats, and headed home.
For dinner, Maylin had picked a sandwich at the grocery store, Téa and I had a pizza slice each (about 1/4 small pizza, they had them as singles but this double in particular was discounted by 20%), and Joe ate potato chips. Apparently because the grocery stores have such a vast selection of fresh meals, the later it gets in the evening, the steeper the discount. We were home again by 7pm, but apparently that’s the magic number, and you get delicious dishes for less. I’ll have to try that another night, we still all had to get home and shower today’s travels off!
Our house rules include quiet hours between 8pm and 8am, so it’ll be interesting to see if our two yellers can remember that, day to day. Hope the neighbours don’t complain! Other than that, it seems like our host is very responsive. The kitchen is very sparsely furnished, and we asked him for a shelf of some sort, as we have nowhere to store food. The shelf is being delivered, and he asked if we would mind assembling it. Me, a Scandinavian, MIND assembling furniture? It’s truly just a treat!!!
Anyways, that’s about it for today, but pop your questions in the comments below, and I’ll do my best to answer!