I didn't know about Nara Park the last time I went to Kyoto so it was a must-go this time
Had a quick western breakfast at Nara Station
We read that it was a 20-minute walk from the Station to the Park but decided to take a cab and thank goodness we did! It was such a long distance we seriously didn't think it looked like a 20-minute walk!
Our first view of Nara Park - huge and expansive
Friendly deer
Vendor selling deer crackers for 200 yen per stack
So many deer!
The street beside the Park which we didn't linger at
We had a lot of fun feeding the deer but the deer were very intelligent.
They walk towards you and follow you relentlessly when you hold the crackers and most would bow at you for crackers. It scared us when the deer wouldn't give up following us!
The Park was very spacious and scenic. Lots of beautiful autumn foliage too!
We would lure the deer to the spot that we want to be photographed at and break the crackers up to feed them so that they didn't gobble everything up too fast for us to take a shot!
I think we would spend the whole day there if we had the luxury of time! It was a lovely to spend time in the nature with these tamed animals.
You could feed them by giving them the crackers directly into their mouth or place the cracker bits on your palm and the deer would eat them off your palm without biting you. At some point, I just wanted to feed them for the sake of feeding them. They seemed ravenous and ate non-stop!
The male ones with sawed off antlers or horns were more aggressive. They would use their shortened stubbed antlers to nudge the smaller sized female deer away so that they got access to the crackers. I felt sorry for them as most people preferred to feed the tamer and more pleasant-looking female deer so I tried to feed the not-so-big male deer. I am sorry but I was terrified of the huge ones and could not bear to get near them or let them get close to me!
Baby was in love with this deer which allowed her to hug it but she was traumatised by another deer which leapt onto her!
It was a very novel experience to feed the deer at Nara Park. My nephew had cautioned us about deer poo and not to wear our best shoes but they were not a concern as the area was very big and the black deer droppings were usually small and hard. They don't stick to your soles if you step on them and none of us complained about stepping on deer poo.
I wouldn't mind going back to Nara Park at all if such an opportunity arises.
We left Nara Park at about 2pm to move on to Fushimi Inari in Kyoto.
This was my second time at Fushimi Inari but it was William's first and I see the venue a must-visit, even if it is a brief one, in Kyoto as these tori gates are unique to Japan.
I would highly recommend donning a kimono or yukata (in summer) when visiting Fushimi Inari. For some reason, I think being pictured in a kimono at Fushimi Inari is more apt than wearing normal clothes.
As crowded as ever
Coming down from the tori gates, we chanced upon the side street selling street food which we were not too keen to try, but it was nice to browse through.
I think we tried this and it could not be compared to the maple leaf cakes on Miyajima!
We had our sushi dinner at Kyoto Station
It was a conveyor belt sushi restaurant, highly recommended for its fresh sushi.
The wait was tolerable, probably under 30 minutes? The above picture was taken after our dinner. I didn't realise a long queue had formed during the time we were having our dinner.
We had the usual stuff for dinner ie. salmon, tuna, prawn, raw scallop, and picked up one or two exotic or unusual looking items ie. fish skin which we didn't delight in eating.
lean whale meat sushi
William insisted that we should try whale meat as whaling is only legitimate in Japan and we will not be able to try whale meat anywhere else.
Well, the texture was not as smooth as normal fish (yeah I know whales are not fish), and it was bland or tasteless on its own. It didn't interest William to try another whale dish when we came across whale meat dishes again.
My humble eating
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