A train ride to Kyoto, and a bus.

We dropped our skis for shipping and got ourselves on the road to Kyoto. It did not stop dumping snow the whole time we were there.

The bus felt like a ski bus to a winter wonderland, until suddenly we came out of a tunnel into a world of green grass and beautiful trees and practically no snow.

the drive kept getting more complicated, from snow to summer all along the coast of Lake Biwa.

The bus took us to Nagano and we got on a train to another train to another. Upon arrival in Kyoto we realized we had made a critical error with our tickets preventing us from being able to leave the station. This led to an intercom call and an extracurricular trip to Kyoto station for me. There was plenty to see along the way, from small cars in impossibly tight parking spaces to candy shops with sweets in the shape of anything you can imagine. Things that are so intricate that you can’t be sure they will taste good while simultaneously dying to put them in your mouth.

Kyoto is a beautiful city, in a very different way from Tokyo. While Tokyo is tall and highly stimulating, Kyoto is shorter and full of old beauty. Around every turn is a shrine or other historic building. Even the houses are beautifully built. Canals run throughout the city and it feels like we are constantly going over bridges.

We are here for the next few days, and it seems like there will be no end to the possibilities of exploration.