Archieve - Japan 2006 (1)

Now that I finally have a photoblog setup, I might as well have old archieved pics posted up. These were taken in Kyoto on June 12th 2006. The theme park that we were in is the Toei Uzumasa Eigamura (Kyoto Studio Park: http://www.japan-guide.com/e/e3934.html).

First known as Heiankyō (平安京 "Heian capital") became the seat of Japan's imperial court in 794. Later, the city was renamed to Kyoto ("capital city"). Kyoto remained Japan's capital until the transfer of the government to Edo in 1868 at the time of the Imperial Restoration. After Edo was renamed to Tokyo (meaning "Eastern Capital"), Kyoto was known for a short time as Saikyo (西京 Saikyō, meaning "Western Capital").

Most think that it is exensive to visit japan. Thats what we first thought before our trip, but it turns out that the standard of living is just about same as here in Toronto. For your reference, the Japanese yen and Candian dollars is about 100 Yen to a dollar Canadian. Our daily spending was just under 10000 yen (100 dollars), thats including hotel and food, the trick is to avoid eating at big restaurant, try their local street food, that will save you a bunch. Our cheapest meal was about 250 yen ($2.5).

We stayed at the Hotel Granvia, which is right above the Kyoto station. It cost about 7500 yen ($75) per person per night, it is one of the best hotel in Kyoto.

While everything else cost just "as much as Toronto", transportation is your killer cost. You WILL benefit from the JR pass (http://www.japanrailpass.net/) if you do plan on travelling to Japan, which entitle you to unlimited rides on the JR system. A JR pass cost roughly ~300 canadian for a 14 days pass. It may sound a lot, but if you are to purchase your transportation tickets locally, it will cost you aproximately 29700 yen ($297) for a round trip on the Shinkansen system to travel between Kyoto and Tokyo. A local train or bus ride runs from 150 yen ($1.5) to 500 yen ($5) on a single trip.

Your other alternative is to skip the JR pass if you don't plan on travelling across Japan. You can then purchase local daily transporation pass, which runs for around 1000 yen ($10).

Now the down side is that, there are little to no activities around Kyoto at night, most places operates between the hours of 10:00AM - 8:00PM.

Stay tuned... more to come...........