We left our hostel around 11am so we could do some shopping. It was chilly and rainy, which naturally just made things even more fun!
There are several covered shopping streets in the downtown area, so we were focusing on those. Cinnamon was looking for a tiny store where she had bought a silver ring on our last trip, as she misplaced or lost it somehow. However, it was not to be. Either the store is incredibly elusive and we completely missed it during our repeated walks up and down the streets, or it's no longer there. This was disappointing, but there's not much that could be done. We did luck out and find a gift to bring our friend Ashley (for you B&N folks, that would be Ashley Madison, who formerly worked in the cafe), who we were going to be visiting in South Korea the next day, so at least it wasn't all for naught.
After wandering the streets for a while, we headed over toward the Gion area. It turned out to be not all that interesting. Most of the stores were selling traditional gifts and/or foods, and looked pretty expensive, so we didn't linger for long. Instead, we headed back to the covered streets and went to the Star Restaurant for lunch! This was the place with all those strawberry parfaits. We didn't have any of them, though. Instead, I had omurice with ketchup sauce (which wasn't bad), and Cinnamon also had omurice, but hers was the "cheese gratin" kind.
Once we had warmed up and filled our tummies, we finally mustered up the energy to head back out into the cold and do some more walking. Our legs and bodies wanted to protest, as mine were a little sore from our hiking the previous day, and the cold, dreary weather just made both of us want to curl up under the covers. That's no way to spend our last day in Kyoto, so we pressed on, headed toward the Imperial Palace!
It wasn't more than a 10 minute walk there, and was very easy to find, so we headed into the garden. The paths were made of tiny little rocks, which were a huge pain to walk on, as they constantly shifted underfoot and gave our ankles quite a workout. But then we came upon this!
It's a plum tree in bloom! So naturally, I had to take about 50 pictures of the blossoms (okay, 97, but who's counting?). Flower photography is what I do best, after all (much to Cinnamon's displeasure)!
So many blossoms!
I like this one. It has a very Japanese look to it (or so I think). Plus, you can see the mountains in the background!
And I thought I might as well include Cinnamon in the picture. She was looking pretty bored. Also, her camera batteries died the day before at Fushimi shrine, so she couldn't participate in the photo fest.
There were actually quite a few people out and about taking pictures. I don't know why you'd want to pass up an opportunity like that--the blossoms were gorgeous!
Finally, we made it to the Imperial Palace itself! ...But you can't get in without making a reservation (which we did not do), so this was as close as we could get.
And then we came upon even more trees in bloom! The map we saw later, near the garden entrance, said these were apricot and peach groves, so... I think this is an apricot flower? They were kind of all mixed in together, though.
I don't really know which flower this is, but it's my favorite picture. I like that it looks like it's blushing. So pretty~ Wish I had taken more pictures from that tree.
It started sprinkling as I was in the middle of taking pictures, so Cinnamon was nice enough to by my "umbrella man", as I called her, and hold her umbrella over me so my camera lens didn't get wet.
And thus, I was able to get more pictures!
...Like these!
Cinnamon liked this gigantic tree, so she gave it a hug. It's huge!
Then she started getting fed up with me and left me, taking her umbrella with her. She has no patience for my flower photography perfectionism. I won't stop until I get a perfectly clear (or near enough) picture!
Here's one final shot of all the trees in bloom before I finally put my camera away and opened up my own umbrella to keep dry.
We finished wandering through the garden (or at least the part we were in), and headed back to our place after stopping for snacks at the conbini. After we had eaten our ice cream, Cinnamon declared she wanted french fries, so we walked across the river to McDonald's and indulged her craving.
We had to get up extremely early (like 6:30am early) the next day in order to catch the shinkansen to Fukuoka (about a 3 hour ride) so we'd have enough time to get to the ferry terminal to check in at 2:15pm. That may sound early, but had we waited for a later train, we would have gotten into Fukuoka too late. But that's a story that will be told next time. Two updates in one day is quite enough for me. I'm headed to bed!
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