Bamboo Break

The day starts early, as we are heading to the famous Arashiyama Bamboo Grove before traveling on to Nara today.

It's a nearly one-hour journey from the hotel, and the recommendations in travel portals and guides to arrive early (to avoid the crowds) makes our night rather short.

After equipping ourselves yesterday with fans and sun umbrellas, which according to the label should make the temperature under the umbrella feel 19.7 degrees cooler (🧐 - hmm, if the outside temperature is only 15 degrees, will one freeze under the umbrella?), the days of sweating are probably numbered.

Yes, it took exactly 2 minutes, and then we were soaking wet. It’s already 30 degrees at 7:30 in the morning. During our train ride, I had the following

Gdesk (thoughts that come to mind)

Japanese people dress conservatively, wearing neutral colors like black, white, all the shades of gray in between, as well as brown, light brown, cream, and navy blue. Bright color splashes are very rare amid the dreary gray - those are usually tourists. This also reflects in the color palette of their cars. 95% of the cars are black, white, and silver-gray.

Women's clothing is usually simply cut, skirts and dresses are not too short, and tops are not too low-cut. Men often wear dress pants with wrinkle-free shirts and shiny shoes.

The train ride ends at Arashiyama Station. We follow the trail of tourists - they must be going there too. You can't imagine how much water is in a human body.

It’s a solid 10-15 minute walk to the bamboo grove.

The crowds are still manageable. A few photos and

we set off on our way home. Passing by a temple, the picture looks very nice, and we decide to go inside.

Here we meet Kristina and Marco, a young couple from Hamburg. They also find it too warm here - sweating connects us.

They give us the tip to search for restaurants via the Table-Check app, an app where Japanese people rate restaurants, and they're said to be quite strict in their assessments. We briefly exchange experiences and talk about where to go next. A nice, friendly couple. Marco reminds me a bit of Jannis, our neighbor, with his open demeanor and mischievous smile.

They plan to relax in Okinawa for another week after their tour - have fun 😊.

I think if they hadn't needed to go to their boat, we would still be chatting.

We make our way to the hotel to grab our bags and then head to Nara.

The journey takes an hour, and we reach Nara at 1:00 PM. Our hotel, the Daiwa Roynet Hotel Nara, is right next to the station. Unfortunately, we have to wait until 2:00 PM for check-in, so we take the time to eat. Japanese home cooking - Udon noodles.

The restaurant has four regular tables and two Japanese tables and feels very family-like. When paying, Shahaatz praises the food in Japanese, and we were then bid farewell by the chef's daughter and her husband, who thanked us for being there and for letting them serve us. All three waved goodbye to us at the door, very sweet.

When we go outside, it’s pouring rain

and there's a huge clap of thunder that makes us jump. Now our sun umbrella can show if it works in the rain too. It handled the rain well; however, it shouldn't have been any windier.

Our room is quite nice, but it only has one bed and one blanket.

But we have a new addition in the room. High-tech toilets are no longer anything special. We now have an LG Styler.

A cabinet that can smooth, dry, and disinfect clothes. Shahaatz dried all the clothes at once since everything was somehow damp.

We spend the afternoon filling the styler and sleeping until Leon wakes us up around 5:45 PM our time.

We decide to end the evening with sushi

and a beer in bed.