Kyoto by Day

My girlfriend and I always dreamed of visiting Japan, I wanna see real cherry blossoms, real people in Kimono and crazy japanese hairstyles that perfectly match their clothing!

If you do book at the Westin, make sure you sign up for the Starwood Preferred Guests program online - it's free and gave us access to a fantastic rate in the first place and then an upgrade to a lovely junior suite (without asking) when we got there! It will depend on availability but it doesn't hurt and seriously I will be looking there first whenever we travel purely for the wonderful beds! lol advertisement ends!

You have very nice pictures of Gion-really perfect that captured very special moments there. Thanks for your advise about the Westin. It gives me an idea....

Kyoto can take a lot out of you, it's true. Probably a good warning to give. Kyoto is in a valley and Gion and many of the temples climb up the hillside so it could be an issue for the disabled or just plain exhausted. There are plenty of flat parts of Kyoto (where the palace is, for one) but the olde worlde bits aren't there. Nevertheless, I am about the least fit person you could imagine and, as I have noted, we were both still very close to our flu bouts so we just took taxis to wherever we were going, walked very slowly while there and frequently returned to the hotel by taxi to rest for a bit (sometimes a couple of hours - 21 is a great movie btw lol).

I highly recommend the Westin Miyako if you are going to need to rest a bit - it was already up the hill and an easy walk to get into Gion and for everywhere else it was less than 1000yen taxi fare (except the train station which was 1420 exactly both was lol) It was also a lovely hotel, great beds (difficult to find in Japan, they are usually very hard) and fantastic service, too, just don't eat at the restaurants or you will think Kyoto is insanely expensive and pretentious!

Love your pictures of Kyoto. Went there last March but before the cherry blossoms came out. Missed Gion at night to see the geishas as we were too tired to leave the hotel again after a full day of walking uphill to the temple complex (forgot the name). Unforgettable trip.