CathInTheCity

Arashiyama

19 Comments | Tokyo 2013

Good morning loves♥ Once again, I got up before the sun, so I’ve had lots of time to go through all the pictures from our day trip to Arashiyama. Prepare for a lot of pics! First I thought I’d tell you how we ended up going there. I was looking at different day trips for us to take at Japanican, and totally fell for the bamboo forest and the temples. We found out that in stead of going on an organized trip, we wanted to go just the two of us. Japanican has lots of different organized tours to gorgeous locations, so if you’re ever going to Tokyo, I would recommend finding whatever catches your eye on that site, and if you feel comfortable with it, just go on your own.

Arashiyama is located in Kyoto, and the train ride there took a little over two hours. We were quite shocked when we saw the price of the train tickets, we payed almost 3000kr for a roundtrip. We didn’t understand why it was so expensive, the train wasn’t that fancy, haha. Then we realized that the distance from Tokyo to Kyoto is actually the same as Bergen-Oslo, which explains the price. Norway has a lot to learn from Japan! If there was a two hour train ride from Bergen to Oslo, I would definitely take the train instead of flying. But anywho, picture time!

The first thing we did when we got there was checking out the monkey park. It was a 20 minute steep hike to get up there, but the surroundings were so beautiful that I almost didn’t hear my own heavy breathing. Remind me to start doing more cardio, I was out of breath after like two minutes, haha.


I love animals, so the monkey park was one of the things I was most excited about. Then I spotted this, and was like “Hey, that monkey park, isn’t that sort of lame? Maybe we should just go back“. I was super scared, monkeys can actually be very dangerous, but my boyfriend comforted me with the fact that they were probably behind a fence..

While hiking up there I was just minding my own business, then all of a sudden I made eye contact with this little guy, and I almost peed my pants. No fence, help!

The monkeys turned out to be pretty cool though, mostly they were just busy scratching their private parts, and didn’t even notice the terrified blonde right in front of them.

The view from the top was amazing!

After that we headed downtown for some food..

I really miss the food in Japan! Everything was so good and new to me.

Then it was time for a little boat ride, which was such an amazing experience. The surroundings were so beautiful, and I think I was the most relaxed I’ve ever been, hanging out at the river while spotting temple after temple on the sides.

Pretending to be meditating again, haha.

After that we walked towards the bamboo groves, and met these pretty ladies. I have always just assumed that these outfits are for special occasions, sort of like the ‘bunad’ we have in Norway, but I saw Japanese girls rocking these every day I was there. Super fun to see!

The bamboo groves was nothing less than breathtaking!!

Walking on this little path surrounded by thousands of super high bamboos was such an amazing experience.

Puh, that was a lot of pictures! I think our trip here must be the most memorable day we had in Japan, it was all just so fun, relaxed and romantic to share with my love. This is my last post from Japan, so if you have any questions for me about the trip, shoot in this post. I’ve gotten some requests to do a Tokyo guide, but I’ve already shared all the things we’ve done, so I don’t know if that’s neccessary. Have a lovely day sweeties♥

Comments

  3. I LOVE your posts about traveling!! I have had a bad experience om a vacation to Barcelona, Spain, so I am really afraid of traveling. I feel really uncomfortable with all the unknown people, places and cultures, but when I read about your traveling experiences it gives me more confident to go on a vacation. You are very positive about everything when it comes to traveling and I am just the opposite, so it is nice to read about the positive aspect. Some day I dream of going to China for a longer period of time, but we’ll have to see about that.
    Anyway, thank you for sharing parts of your life with us. It is very brave of you.

  4. Thank you for your sweet words! I’m so sorry you had a bad experience while traveling, and I definitely understand that it can be scary for you to go on new trips. But I really hope you get the courage to do it, there’s so many incredible things to see in the world!! :) Crossing my fingers that your China dream comes true!! <3

  15. Det de japanske jentene har på seg heter yukata. Kan vel si at det er en mer uformell versjon av kimono, som er som bunaden i Norge og brukes kun ved spesielle anledninger. En yukata er ikke så vanskelig å få på seg som kimono og både menn og kvinner bruker yukataen spesielt i sommertider, siden den er lett og få på seg. I gamle dager så ble det brukt som badekåpe etter et bad. Idag så har det blitt mer moteriktig og til daglig bruk. Utrolig fine bilder!

  18. I’m so inspired by you and your beautiful pictures, Cathrine!! So Tokyo here we come!!!!! Next month I’ll be walking in your steps, hihi! Can’t wait! There will for sure be a new Ltd #artscarf collection from Japan :-) Take care sweetie!

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