I wrote my post for Day 7 before heading out to dinner, so here is how that went. I talked over to Gion, the Geisha district in Kyoto. Gion is home to many famous tea houses, which foreigners are not allowed to visit. I read that one even declined to serve George Bush and Stephen Spielburg, simply because they were not close friends with a current regular.

I met up with Nate at a restaurant called Gion Tanto, which is in a beautiful area (at night at least) of Gion.

As you can see, the restaurant has tatami floors. Everything that has these generally has you remove your shoes before going in. This was no exception. One of the trip advisor reviewers said they were run out of the restaurant for entering with shoes on. Hilarious.

We didn’t have that problem so we waited a bit and then got a seat the bar and were served our meal. In a lot of Japanese restaurants, you actually place your order while you are waiting so that its ready or near-ready when you are seated.

I had the “special”, which was an Okonomiyaki. Its basically a pancake with a bunch of meats (porf, beef, shrimp, squid) and some vegetables piled together. It was very similar to the Hiroshimayaki we had in Hiroshima a few days before, but I personally enjoyed the Hiroshimayaki more because of the soba noodles. Okonomiyaki does not have those.

Now, on to day 8.

Everyone went their separate ways to start the day, so I set out to find a good Tempura restaurant. I found one called Tempura Endo Yasaka that I decided to try. It was over south of Gion, so I went for a little walk to make my way over.

I made my way to the restaurant and sat outside to wait for a few minutes. I was then re-directed to a second location of the restaurant down the road, since they were busy for lunch and I did not have a reservation. It seems that most restaurants do reservations in Japan, both for lunch and dinner.

I was a little worried about getting a sub-par experience, but my concerns were soon alleviated.

I had the entire restaurant to myself when I arrived, which meant I had…

• Two personal servers
• One personal chef
• One personal guy watching to make sure everything was perfect

The service was impeccable, and the restaurant setting was quite nice as well.

I selected the Tempura Course “Komogawa”, which was 10 tempura sets, rice and cabbage with tempura fritters, soup, and an appetizer. I also had a bottle of Asahi beer.

1. Fried corn
2. Fried bread w/ shrimp paste
3. Fried Green Beans w/ pea paste
4. Shrimp
5. Prawns
6. Fried White Fish
7. Fried Whole fish
8. Fried Squid
9. Fried Eel

Thats all I can remember.

It was a really great meal. Part way through, a large group of Japanese visitors from Tokyo arrived. I chatted with Miwa (pronounced Miva), who works for the Kiran beer brewery in marketing. He was an extremely nice gentleman, and took the time to stand and shake my hand and bow when I left.

The servers in the restaurant also walked me to the door, opened the door, walked me down the stairs, and bowed when I left. That is a cool aspect of Japan you just don’t see anywhere else that I have traveled.

Post-lunch, I headed to rent a bike to ride around the city for a half day. Kyoto Gojo Cycles was cheap, easy to work with, and provided me with a quality bike to explore. No helmets required or adults, so against my better judgement I went without. I have noticed that bikes are common, helmets are not, and that drivers are very aware of cyclists. Japanese driving is like the rest of Japan – calm, collected, orderly. I have not seen any wrecks or near-wrecks in my time here so far.

Nate joined me, so we headed over to the far western side of Kyoto to see the Arishiyama Bamboo Forest.

Near the Arishiyama station, it seemed like things got a bit busier and more touristy (though with a lot of Japanese tourists).

After about a 45 minute ride (or so), we made it to the bamboo forests.

Beautiful area. I just wish I had caught it at a time when there were less people walking around.

After exploring the Arishiyama area, we rode back and returned our bikes on the other side of Kyoto, and then headed to Gion to try some matcha. From wikipedia, “Matcha is finely ground powder of specially grown and processed green tea leaves”, so there’s that.

We went to Saryo Tsujiri. There was a short line, but when you are seated you are served some green tea, and then can order from an array of wonderful looking desserts. I had a matcha parfait.

Yum.

I stopped by a coffee shop and did a little reading for an hour or two before dinner. I just wrapped up a book called Shogun by James Clavell, which is about an Englishman that shipwrecks in historic Japan and integrates into the Samurai culture. Think of the movie “Last Samurai”, but much better and with better acting.

When I finished the book, it was dinner time. Instead of Japanese, Nate and I headed over to Himalaya Nepalese Restaurant. It turned out to be more of an Indian restaurant, but that was okay. The food was quite good, especially the large Garlic Naan bread.

We got a few beers and split Tandori Chicken, Butter Chicken Curry and Spinach Curry, and cheese and garlic naan breads.

As you can see, there wasn’t much left at the end.

Cheers!