Kyoto (5/24-5/30)!
This was my most favorite trip so far… even though it was pretty hot there. Just finished a busy project at work and wanted to treat myself to a vacation. From what I heard, Kyoto is usually pretty crowded and buses are full so to avoid all that, I decided to take my bicycle with me for the first time anywhere. I was a little nervous about it even though I’ve read a lot about rinko and travelling by train with a bicycle. This bicycle bag only requires I remove the front wheel, handlebars, saddle, and pedals. For riding on trains, the operators are mostly concerned with cleanliness so usually as long as the bottom half of the bike is covered it’s fine (although I’ve seen some bikes get on the train with only the top half covered). Space on the trains for bicycles are usually in the very first or very last cars where the wheelchair areas are… and on the shinkansen there is some space behind the very last row of seats in each car (so reserve those if carrying big luggage on the shinkansen). Also, with the shinkansen, if using the regular ticket machines at, say a JR station, don’t reserve by the row or seat number, the seats always face the direction of travel (for example, row 30 might be in the front and row 1 in the back). The mistake I made was also bringing a large suitcase, doubling the amount of back row space I needed. The overhead storage rack above the seats are about as big enough for a carry-on size suitcase only. Shinkansen from Shin-Yokohama to Kyoto takes about 2 hours and cost about ¥13200 each way. But, enough of the information, lets get to the pictures! I must have taken over 800 photos so I’m breaking this trip down into a series of posts.
First full day in the bag! I was really glad that I decided to bring my bicycle with me at this point. It really allowed me to follow my own schedule and go at my own pace, and yes the buses were all crowded… there were a lot of school children from all over Japan visiting (I was told every school child visits Kyoto when they are young) and there were also a lot of Chinese tour groups. I managed to avoid much of that just by riding my bicycle around and it really wasn’t that difficult as much of Kyoto is pretty flat.
Here’s a link to my Strava recording of my bike ride for those that are interested too: