Nakayasumi Day 3: Kyoto, Nara, and back home!

After a couple of super busy days, we were all pretty tired in the morning, so we had relaxed start to the day. 

The kitchen/ dining/ computer/ living area in our hostel was very nice and convenient! I did not expect our hostel to be this awesome! Marina even made breakfast for some of us!

I woke up with no plans, aside from our bus back to Kanazawa at 4:30. But there was talk of a little trip to Nara, so I jumped on the train and headed over!

An hour later, and we arrived! Because we had a late start and made a quick YOLO decision to go to Nara, we only had a solid two hours to spend there.But I figured I might as well get a little idea of what it's like since I was so close! 

And because I wanted to see deer. 

the deer says hi. I speak deer, so I am sure. 

Look at that deer. What a poser. Acting natural. 

To be honest, the deer were cute and awesome for the first few minutes. Then they multiplied, and it got a little creepy. Deer-sugiru? Possibly. 

The wood construction in the top left corner is the Nandaimon Gate, with two giant guardian statues (one of them is pictured in the bottom right). It marks the entrance to the famous Todaiji Temple. 

Poppin a squat with some deer. 

Here is the Todaiji Temple! Since we didn't have the time to go in, I took a quick pic before weaving my way through the crowds of deer and people back to the train station. 

I am definitely glad I went to Nara, but I'm not sure if it's a place I'd like to return to anytime soon...It was beautiful and all, but....it was a bit of an explicit tourism trap, exploiting the deer as an attraction...which they are, but it was a bit too unnatural to have tons of deer walking around begging for deer cookies being sold at the stalls. I'm glad I saw it though! Now back to Kyoto!

We quickly stopped by the hostel to pick up our bags, then caught our bus back to Kanazawa at 4:30 at  Kyoto Station. 

We were on the second floor of the double decker bus together, so it was a fun ride back!

And a beautiful one too! Luckily, I was sitting next to Marina, who understands my desire to take a picture at everything I see, so I felt no shame going snap happy with my camera on the bus! In fact, whenever we looked out the window, we simultaneously scrambled for our cameras. It's become our natural instinct. 

The sky was amazing after the downpour of rain. The clouds were clearing and the sun was like BAM. 

Also, Marina and I jammed on my iPhone for a solid two hours (plus some)...It was a fun dance party. I think we covered everything from classical music to High School Musical. 

We made quite a few stops along the way, which made this a great photo opportunity to get a still picture! It get's pretty challenging to take a landscape photo on a fast moving bus!

Overall, the bus ride took over 7 hours with traffic from a car accident and all the stops that we took. However, I didn't mind at all because I was just hanging with mah frenzz and listening to music! It was a great time! I can't believe I was in Kanazawa, Kyoto, Osaka, and Nara, all in three days! So much fun and shopping and exploring and eating and all that good stuff.

 Made me thankful once again to be in Japan!