After breakfast, Gypsy and I arranged for a taxi to take us to Uneno Dashi. Not feeling up to visiting a few days ago, Gypsy was ready to pick up some of the instant dashi for herself and others. Yoshiko Uneno was there and remembered me from two days ago. Gracious as before, she gave us tastings of the various instant dashi products before we decided upon our purchases. |
Yoshiko showed us on her cell phone stores in the US that sell their dashi products including: The Japanese Pantry (San Francisco), which she also tells us make "very great" miso and offers cooking classes; and Toiro (West Hollywood / LA), an artisanal kitchen supply store. Toiro's website also has recipes and a link to their YouTube channel.
After lunch at our Hotel Rings, we took a taxi to Fushimi Inari Shrine, which is an important Shinto shrine in the southern precinct of Kyoto. It is famous for its thousands of vermillion painted tore gates that straddle a network of trails that lead into the wooded forest of the sacred Mount Inari. This Shinto shrine is considered the most important out of several thousands that are dedicated to Inari, the god of rice. As the taxi driver leaves us off at an intersection, he points in the direction we need to walk to reach the shrine. The street is packed with people coming and going from the direction we are heading. Probably only a surprise to me, the plaza in front of the Shrine is packed with people — almost exclusively Japanese. |
As we experienced visiting the Tenryuji Temple a few days earlier, many women are wearing traditional Japanese dress.
At the shrine's entrance is the Romon Gate. Behind it is the main hall (honden) Still not feeling one-hundred percent, and looking at the steep path and throng of people, Gypsy decides to wait while I go on.
At the shrine's entrance is the Romon Gate. Behind it is the main hall (honden) Still not feeling one-hundred percent, and looking at the steep path and throng of people, Gypsy decides to wait while I go on.
At the back of the shrine's main grounds is the entrance to the tori gate-covered hiking trail that starts with two dense, parallel rows of gates called Senbon Torii meaning "thousands of torii gates." Each gate was donated by individuals and companies, with the donors name inscribed on the back. Apparently, donations to sponsor a torii gate starts around $2,600US for smaller ones and goes up to $7,000US or more for larger gates. Unlike publicity photos, the trail is packed with people.
The hike to the summit and back takes several hours and along the way are smaller shrines with stacks of miniature torii gates that were also donated by visitors. There are also a few restaurants along the trail. Since Gypsy is waiting for me below, I turned around after 30 minutes having reached the half-way mark at the Yotsutsuji intersection. |
Leaving the shrine, we walk almost back to the where we were left off a few hours earlier before we are able to hail a taxi to back to Hotel Rings. We asked our driver to leave us off near the Nishiki Market and walked the rest of the way to Hotel Rings. Later we ventured out to see the lights of the city!