Gion

Today is our first free day in Kyoto, so we took a taxi over to Maruyama Park. It's known for having great cherry blossoms and hanami parties. The parks has many food booths, but most were not open or set up at the time we were there because it was so early in the morning. We took many more pictures of the cherry blossoms and visited some of the Shinto shrines nearby.

From there, we walked up to Kiyomizu Temple. It's a bit of a hike through some narrow roads, and we stopped along the way to do some shopping. Alexis paid more attention to the stores while Shin paid more attention to the food stalls and restaurants. While walking, we spotted a couple of maiko, and Alexis took a picture with them. Alexis was a little reluctant to approach them, but the maiko happily accepted Alexis' request. At the top of the hill, we reached Kiyomizu Temple, and it is very nice up there. You have great views of the city, and the cherry blossoms up there are very nice. It's amazing that they build a beautiful temple on the side of this hill. We ran short on time, so we had to cut our trip to Kiyomizu a little short so we can make it to our kabuki performance.

Our kabuki performance was playing at the Minamiza Theater which is about a 20-25 minute walk from Kiyomizu, We walked down the hill, and we picked up our tickets from a kiosk, and then we had to find some food before the performance. We did not have much time, but fortunately we found a small okonomiyaki restaurant. This restaurant serves Kyoto style okonomiyaki which is a bit different compared to other parts of Japan. Our restaurant served okonomiyaki in a crepe like exterior and it was filled with all sorts of wonderful goodness and topped with lots of sauce. It was really quick, relatively cheap, and quite tasty. The performance we went to go see was Bando Tamasaburo. Our seats were great. They were only a few rows from the front, and the theater was packed full of people. Most of the people in the audience were probably at least twice our age, so we felt quite young. It was a nice performance, and we were glad we were able to experience the kabuki while in Kyoto. After the performance, we went to a coffee shop selling Kyoto style coffee. It's a very unique style of preparation where the coffee is heated over a flame. Blue Bottle Coffee in San Francisco has a similar offering and at least one of their locations. Outside the coffee shop, Alexis picked up some mochi with sakura leaf as a snack.

Once we were done with coffee, we decided to head up to the shops near Kiyomizu again since Alexis wanted to do more shopping. As we walked up, I spotted a few of the food stalls I saw earlier in the morning. At one place, I saw that they were selling korokke, but there was something next to the korokke that caught my eye. I asked what it was, and the shop keeper said it was a korokke with miso gratin sauce and kuro mame sandwiched in a monaka shell. After she described it, I had to have one. It was good, but I think I will stick to the traditional korokke in the future. I also saw a women selling something that looked like oden on a stick. I ordered a jagaibataa which was a potato butter on a stick. It was really tasty, and if we didn't have an 8PM kaiseki reservation, I probably would have continued to eat. While I was pigging out, Alexis purchased a few more small items, and then we went back to the hotel to get dressed for dinner.