Well the day got off to a bad start. I had misread the train schedules the night before when I was checking everything; I had planned to take a direct train from Kyoto to Nara (almost 40 minutes by a limited express train) which I thought had been run by the JR Group (so I could ride for free with my pass), but was actually a private rail line. So to save money, I had to wait for the next JR train to Nara, which was a much slower local train. So by the time I got to Nara, I had about 90 minutes to look around if I wanted to get to Amanohashidate by my planned time...and it was not nearly enough time to cover the recommended sights (I needed at least another hour). So I only got to visit 2 temples while in Nara, but at least I got to see one of Nara's major sights: Todai-ji, home to the 15m tall Great Buddha of Nara (the largest bronze statue in Japan, and the largest gilt bronze statue of Buddha in the world). The walk from the train station didn't help with my time dilemma either, it took almost 20 minutes to get to Todai-ji (while it's rated at 10 minutes in the guidebook), not counting my short detour to Kofuku-ji, which was along the way. But beyond all the temples in Nara, I think I can safely say (despite only being in Nara for 90 minutes) that it could easily be the land of deer (specifically the sika deer species)...there were a lot and they were everywhere...they're allowed to wander everywhere without being harassed because the Japanese view the deer as messengers of Buddha (in accordance with Buddhist belief). In fact, the deer in Nara are designated as National Treasures and so it's forbidden to harm them. Nara Park, where the main temples that make up the UNESCO World Heritage Site "Historic Monuments of Ancient Nara" are located (including Todai-ji), is also home to the numerous deer...unfortunately I didn't get to walk around the large Nara Park due to time constraints.
Along the way to the temples, outside the Nara Kintetsu train station (the private line I had accidentally mistaken as a JR line). I think the man in the traditional ware is some sort of donation collector or beggar?...I had seen a few of these guys in various places across Japan, in the streets and near train stations. They'd just stand there, occasionally ringing a bell, and a few passersby would give them small change.
At Kofuku-ji. It looked like there was some excavation work going on (in the third photo). You can already see the deer roaming freely here.
A close encounter with a deer haha. It was an inch away, sniffing me to see if I was food. They're so used to the human presence, and it's against the law to harm them, so they're not the least bit afraid of people walking right up to them.
Like I said, the deer are everywhere, and that includes the sidewalks. I found the second photo amusing...the deer looked like it was walking along like it was one of us hahaha.
Approaching Todai-ji...again, deer everywhere! Nandaimon (Great Southern Gate in English), the main gate of Todai-ji, is shown in the third photo.
The 2 very, very large wooden sculptures of Nio guardians inside Nandaimon. Not only were they huge, they were highly detailed...very daunting pieces of work.
The middle gate to the Daibutsuden (Great Buddha Hall), the main temple building of Todai-ji.
The Daibutsuden, supposedly the world's largest wooden building, and home of the Daibutsu (Great Buddha). There was obviously a fee to get in, but I paid it since I really wanted to see the giant Buddha statue.
An eerie looking Buddha statue that was situated beside the entrance of the Daibutsuden.
At the entrance of the Daibutsuden.
The Daibutsu. Yes, it was very big to say the least haha.
Some of the other statues in the temple.
A popular activity in the temple. This particular rear support pillar of the temple has a hole near the bottom that's supposedly the same size as the size of the Daibutsu's nostril. Folklore has it that if you can crawl through the hole, you will have good luck...though it's well known now that most adults won't be able to crawl through it without some strong assistance haha.
Back outside, in front of the Daibutsuden.
The deer grabbed the guy's map and started eating it. It was quite funny to watch - he spent a good half minute playing tug-o-war with the deer for the map.
Because I was strapped for time, and the walk back towards the train station from the temple took longer than I expected, I had to take the private Kintetsu line back to Kyoto (instead of the JR line) in order to catch the next train to Amanohashidate (since the direct trains to Amanohashidate are quite infrequent), and I had to catch the limited express train too (as opposed to the regular local train). However, I didn't know beforehand that taking the limited express train cost extra. And on top of that, I accidentally boarded the first-class reserved seat car! So when the conductor came around to check the tickets, you can imagine how surprised I was to learn how much extra I owed. But luckily, due to the language barrier, my obvious confusion, and the conductor's kind heart, he went against company policy (gasp! seriously it was so unexpected in a place like Japan) and let me continue the rest of the trip in the car without paying the extra fees! You can see I was all alone in the car, so that may have been another reason he let it go. It was a nice car though, very cushy seats, and even a fancy open spiral staircase inside (the first-class cars were 2 floors)!
When I got back to Kyoto, I had only a few minutes to catch my train to Amanohashidate, so I was forced to buy my lunch (since it was now around noon) from one of the more expensive bento shops. Normally, whenever I had a long train ride ahead that ran around noon, I'd grab just a cheap bento box (nothing special), but I decided to snap a picture of this one since it came in a fancy wood-patterned foam box (it was the only time I ever bought the fancier bento boxes).
Getting to Amanohashidate wasn't the greatest experience though. It took just over 2 hours by the direct train to get there. But there was a downside to taking the direct train, which the JR customer service failed to inform me about when I went to book reserved seats (which is free for JR pass holders) - the last leg of the trip to Amanohashidate was on a private line, meaning the JR pass didn't cover the entire trip and I had to pay extra fees (which costs a lot by the way). So you can imagine how surprised I was when I got off the train, half-groggy from falling asleep on the 2 hour train ride, and the old Japanese ticket man kept saying "JR pass no!" without being able to explain the situation in English. After clarification with a laminated sheet of explaining the extra fees in English (I'm not sure why he didn't just show me this in the beginning), I ended up having to pay 1480 yen (almost $20 CDN) for the regular fare, the limited express fare, and the reserved seat fare! (Since I'm on a budget, $20 CDN is quite a lot, and I'd rather spend it on something else, especially when I bought the JR pass to avoid transportation costs when I got to Japan.)
Amanohashidate is one of the 3 most scenic spots in Japan because of its main attraction: the 3.3km long sand bar covered entirely with 1000s of pine trees. It connects the 2 sides of Miyazu Bay, sort of like a land bridge. So then what's so special about this sand bar? Apparently, when you view the sand bar upside down from one of the 2 scenic spots at the top of the hills (one at each end), the sand bar looks like a bridge to heaven (at least according to the Japanese). The method of viewing the sand bar even has its own name - "mata-nozoki" - you stand up on the viewing platform, turn your back to the sand bar, then bend over and gaze from between your legs! It sounds really touristy, but it's not a new thing the locals came up with to attract more foreigners; Japanese have been doing this for hundreds of years when visiting Amanohashidate. So, I made the short walk from the train station to the sand bar (it's not a big town) and walked the entire length of the sand bar to the other side. It's rated as a 50 minute walk on the tourist map, but it took me 90 minutes for some reason...probably because I was trying to soak in the scenery (hey I had to pay extra to get here right? haha). It was really serene though - calm waters on both sides, the occasional casual cyclers passing by, a couple of light sand beaches along the way, a few old men fishing on the short rocky paths that led out to the water, random (to me) small buildings and figures (and a shrine!), and the strangely shaped pine trees surprisingly growing in very sandy soil. The pine trees were everywhere along the path; the blanket of green provided a nice contrast to the blue waters and off-white sands though.
At Amanohashidate (you can see the logo on the station sign is no longer JR).
At the first bridge leading to the sand bar, which happened to be a turning bridge...and it just so happened as I got there, the bridge operator closed it temporarily to let several ships pass through.
At the beginning of the path along the sand bar.
Some shots from my walk along the sand bar. You can see how many of the pine trees grew in strange shapes - some at such steep angles they required artificial support to keep them standing. The last photo is of one of the several seemingly random things that were explicitly put on display...I didn't understand any of them since there was no English, so don't ask me about the significance of the big hollow logs haha.
When I got to the other end, I followed the hand-drawn tourist map through Kono Shrine (which looked recently renovated, so it wasn't too appealing to me) and some tiny alleys to the cable car that went up to the sightseeing spot in Kasamatsu Park (perched on the slope of Nariai-san). I spent at least a good 15 minutes at the spot taking in the view and trying mata-nozoki. I guess I could see how some people could interpret the view as the bridge to heaven, but I didn't see it right away...I had to concentrate a bit to really picture it haha. But like I said before, the town is small, so after taking multiple pictures of the sand bar, there wasn't much left to do but to head back to the train station. The walk back through the sand bar went a lot faster on the return trip though, around 45 minutes. Since I was catching the same direct train back to Kyoto, I knew I'd have to pay extra fees again...except I made quite a stupid mistake. For reasons I can't understand (maybe I was a little tired from the 6.5km+ of walking), I showed my JR reserved seat ticket to the ticket man, so the ticket man showed me that I had to pay the standard fare, the limited express fare, and the reserved seat fare for the trip along the private line. But unlike the first time, when the other ticket man had just asked me to pay the total sum, this guy broke down the costs into the 3 different fees. So I realized that I could save some money by not riding in a reserved seat (unreserved is actually good enough, but I usually got a reserved seat when riding the JR trains since reservations could be made for free with the JR pass, the reserved seats and cabins are nicer, and those without a JR pass have to pay extra for a reserved seat).
Well, turns out it's quite difficult (more than I expected) trying to explain in simple English (to a man who understands very little English) that I no longer wanted to ride in the reserved section and instead ride the unreserved section using my JR pass. After spending 10 minutes of getting nowhere (even imitating ripping my reserved seat ticket and then pointing incessantly at the JR pass), I caved and paid another 1480 yen. To understand why I tried to avoid paying the reserved seat fare, its always almost the same price as the regular fare (the limited express fare is only a little over 100 yen), so almost $10 CDN (hey that's a complete meal!). The limited express fare was unavoidable; taking a non-direct train would have increased the travel time from 2 hours to 3-5 hours (depending on layover time) one way!
So at the end of the day, just to get a view of (supposedly) one of the 3 most scenic spots in Japan, I had to (unexpectedly) fork out a total extra of 4210 yen (for the train rides from and to Kyoto, the ride between Nara and Kyoto, and the cable car rides...I couldn't find a hiking path up the mountain) - about $50 CDN! $50 CDN in Japan was worth one night's board, a lunch, and a dinner! The whole reason I bought the JR pass was to avoid having to pay extra transportation costs since I knew it was much more expensive in Japan. So would I recommend Amanohashidate...well, because I had to skip so much of Nara and pay so much extra to get there, my opinion is probably a bit biased, but if you're on a tight budget, I'd say you can skip it and just look at photos on the internet hahaha. I'll let you decide for yourself from the photos below.
The view from the other end of the sand bar.
At Kono Shrine.
Riding the cable car.
Mata-nozoki!
The view of the sand bar upside down (does it look like a bridge to heaven?).
The normal view of the sand bar.
The view from mata-nozoki!
A "wisdom ring". There were a few of these around town. Basically you "donate" some money to get a few small discs, and attempt to throw the discs through the ring. The more discs you're able to throw through the ring, the wiser you will be. The poor girl didn't get any of the discs through, but the ring was quite far, and she was only a small child, so it wasn't really fair for her.
A few more photos from the sightseeing spot (this view was quite pricey, so I took a lot of photos to remember it haha).
Going back down.
Along the walk back across the sand bar (there were infrequent public buses that went from Kasamatsu Park to the train station, but why come all this way to not walk the sand bar?). Am I missing something, or is there really nothing to see in the designated display (in the third photo)?
Briefly enjoying the beach along the sand bar.
One more photo from the sand bar, back at the other end.
Among the many drink and cigarette vending machines in Japan, there are also a large number of vending machines selling these ice cream treats (though not nearly as common as the drink and cigarette ones). I had seen a few around before, but I finally decided to try one at the train station since I had quite a bit of time to kill until the next train arrived.
Back in Kyoto, I finally found a place to eat that wasn't Western food and was affordable, a standing noodle shop inside the Kyoto train station (meaning if I didn't have the JR pass, I would have never had such easy access to it)! For less than 500 yen, I got a pretty big bowl of udon noodles in cold soup broth mixed with wasabai, with an entire soft-boiled egg cooked in tempura batter, a piece of tempura chicken on a skewer, a piece of tempura squid on a skewer, and as much toasted rice as I wanted (putting toasted rice - think rice krispies, it's exactly the same - is quite a popular topping to noodles in Japan, and it really is delicious)! A great deal for the price, and the food was really good. I didn't get a chance to take a picture of my food though - you're supposed to eat fast (well at least everyone else does) in the stand-up noodles shops in the train stations since almost all the customers are always rushing to grab a quick meal before catching their trains. After the well-needed meal, I headed back to the hostel for some much-needed sleep.
A restaurant I spotted on my walk back to the hostel. Don't ask me how a "cheese bar" makes money, and what is so magical about cheese haha.
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