Our time in Kyoto was winding down, so we spent 11/04 in Arashiyama, a district that’s on the outskirts of the city. It’s a scenic area surrounded by mountains and is known for its temples, the bamboo grove, and monkey park. I really liked the area and recommend going if you’re in Kyoto 🙂 My husband and I met up with our friends again before heading over by train.
We wanted to see the bamboo grove, but we weren’t sure where it was. We just knew it was by Tenryuji Temple, which we found first as we walked west from the station. We chose to enter the garden, and it’s a beautiful place, especially near the pond where large koi were swimming.
As we walked towards the back of the garden, we found the bamboo grove! (It’s outside of the garden though, so we had to exit first.) It’s basically a short walking path surrounded with really, really tall bamboo.
After that, we took a path near the river and walked towards monkey park, where monkeys freely walk around. The park is in the mountains, with its entrance near Togetsukyo Bridge.
You’re able to feed them too! However, this is all done inside of a feeding building and only with the food the park sells. The windows are covered with wire to protect visitors. The monkeys from the outside climb up to the window when they want food. You can tell they’re used to this because the moment they see you, they stick their arm in, waiting for you to offer them something. They’re pretty smart too, as my husband tried to trick one by offering an empty peanut shell. The monkey immediately threw it to the ground XD;;
Because of its location in the mountain, monkey park also offers a great view of Kyoto. As we were looking around, some music began to play and one of the caretakers walked around throwing seeds on the ground, attracting soooo many monkeys. Though the staff tell you to keep your distance from the monkeys, they seemed to ignore us for the most part if we didn’t have food.
We were starting to get hungry ourselves and made the trek down the mountain. We looked at restaurants near the base of the park and settled on a noodle place with soba and udon. I ordered one of their udons, which tastes as good as it looks. The broth was especially nice after the egg was mixed in, and it made me want to drink it all 🙂
From here, we returned to the city and separated from our friends. They went to a cat cafe (I’m allergic to cats, so I passed on this), while my husband and I checked out Gion. Gion is a geisha district, filled with old style wooden buildings. I love how Kyoto is a mix of modern and old style areas.
Since we were pretty close to our hotel, we walked back instead of taking the train. Part way there, we noticed many people walking and resting near the river, so we decided to do the same.
For dinner, we went back to Ramen Koji! For the fourth time! This time, we chose Ikkousha and ordered a rich pork broth ramen with scallions. It was my favorite of the ramens we tried! The rich broth was delicious and the scallions helped cut some of that fatty taste.
This wraps it up for Kyoto! My next entry will cover Hakone and our experience at a ryokan (traditional Japanese inn) 🙂
Guhhhh. Stop with the Japan photos! Makes me really want to go back there like NOW LOL. Just kidding, but awesome photos as always! Tenryuji sounds so familiar. Makes me wonder if I encountered that in Hakuouki. Probably, since Hakuouki does take place in Kyoto for the most part . . .
AHHHHHH!!!!!!!
These pictures are amazing! I’m like Tara, STOP! I’m so excited and happy about these pictures~ I wanna go so bad~!
But otherwise, I love them 🙂
Good LORD all that food looks so good! I absolutely love sushi and sashimi, and it’s so good when it’s done by an actual Japanese sushi master. Most of the local places here are either Chinese- or American-operated, so I was particularly ecstatic when I ate at a new restaurant and it was Japanese-owned!
Monkeys seem to be really popular in Asian countries. In China we climbed a local mountain, and one of the only attractions there were the monkeys. Some were caged up, the “dangerous” ones, the caretaker said. The others roamed freely, so we weren’t allowed to eat around them. But we could feed them fruit. It was a little scary, especially since the alpha male was described as temperamental and hot-headed and he wasn’t caged up. But still very cute, there were so many little babies!
I’d love to go to that park in Nara. Deer are so great. Japan looks so beautiful; Arashiyama is certainly a gorgeously scenic area 😀
sigh, kyoto is always so beautiful and breathtaking (no, I’ve never been there b-but I-I’ve watched anime! and dramas! LOL) then again japan is always so beautiful for me.
oh my, bamboo grove is definitely the kind of place i always seek for in traveling. i love visiting places closely tied to nature and ugh the bamboo grove is gonna be in my list of must visit places in life. once i went to bali in hope that i could explore the forests and waterfall instead of just the beaches but couldn’t find anything as…fulfilling as what the bamboo grove could offer. this is amazing.
the monkeys are adorable >w< are they naughty? the ones i met in bali were bad 🙁 they can steal people's glasses and other shiny things (yea they're allowed to roam around freely, not caged)
omg the food is so gorgeous!! the egg ahhh *o* you're making me crave for udon in the middle of the night :((
Kyoto definitely has a lot of beautiful spots 🙂 If you’re looking for a place where you can explore forests and waterfalls, Hawaii is actually great for that, especially Kauai and Big Island. There’s some great hiking trails!
http://www.silent-white.com/2013/11/big-island-part-1/
http://www.silent-white.com/2013/12/big-island-part-2/
There’s warning signs saying that monkeys may steal plastic bags, so they made sure we weren’t carrying any. Other than that, the monkeys didn’t really interact with us except for getting food, haha.
The monkey place is amazing!! I can’t believe they just roam around free and clear. You’re kind of brave for going so close too! Hope they don’t bite anyone.
As usual, beautiful pictures! Your food ones make me drool so much. Wish we could get that kind of thing around here! Yum.
Oooo love the pictures of Japan! I didn’t go to Kyoto when I was in Japan but I heard that it was a beautiful city to visit. It’s awesome that you were able to find the bamboo grove, even if by accident haha.
Oh geez, I miss the noodles in Japan, they were so fantastically awesome. I was only able to find something close to is in Sydney but nothing in my city is nearly as tasty!
I love that first photo you posted, reminds me of a postcard!
The scenery looks amazing, I love seeing leaves in different colours and the bamboo looks so tall! I don’t think I’ve seen them that tall before lol.
I always find it interesting to see photos of cities looking so condensed and packed, different compared to Sydney *^*
So many parts of Japan looks so beautiful!!! I can see why they call the little section at my school the Japanese Garden- the koi and the surroundings looks similar to your pictures!!
It’s so cool how you’re in the house while the monkeys are free to do whatever they want outside! I like how the animals are free in Japan, like the Deer from your other post and cats for an island in Japan too.
I love how you have so many of these authentic Japanese food!!!! You must be loving the stay there with being able to stuff yourself with the food!!!!!
Udonnn!!! Good to see that you got yourself a bowl of some good udon there & not just ramen. It’s such an underrated noodle soup, but it’s delicious. Did you get to eat any homemade soba in Japan?
So dreamy, your photos of Japan are wonderful. It’s such a beautiful country. You took excellent photos of the Japanese Macaques! I’ve taken a few primate classes (Anthro major & all) so I looooooouuurrrvvvveeee monkeys. They’re very very smart as you’ve noted. Macaques are a very interesting species too. Each group of macaques have their own culture. Some wash potatoes in the lakes, while others don’t & do something differently. It’s very fascinating, really! Jealous you got to observe them! The bamboo grove though, wowwwwww. Absolutely stunning!!
Ramen, 4 times at the same place?! dang, that place must be delicious haha.
I didn’t get any soba! I feel like I need to go back and eat some of the foods I missed, haha.
That’s cool that you recognized they were Macaques! I didn’t know those things about them 🙂 I was pretty amazed at how many there were, and how they didn’t seem to care about the people around them.
haha, yeah, the ramen place contains 8 restaurants that represent different regions, so we wanted to try all of them 🙂 (We only got through 4 though.)
I love how Japanese suburbs look. It looks rather cozy and I would love to live and get lost in that little town in the second photo! I was expecting to see a geisha walk about in a kimono in the bamboo grove but maybe I’ll watch the movie instead, hehe.
Of course monkeys are geniuses, haha! They kind of look like the monkeys in the hot springs that I’ve seen somewhere before. I’m sure they’re the same species. Feeding them kind of reminds me of Six Flags Safari back in the early 2000s when monkeys freely ran up and down your car for you to feed, but they’ve stopped allowing visitors to feed. I really wonder why can’t Six Flags provide visitors with food to feed the monkeys? That’s the best part of the Safari!
And that is a photo of REAL udon, not the makeshift stuff they make here. Yum!
Are those schoolgirls near the river?
Thanks for all the comments on my Japan entries! I think those are the same type of monkeys that are known to go in the hot springs in northern Japan 🙂
Yep, those are school girls near the river. Kids in their school uniforms was a really common sight!