Torii Gates

 Since Diem and Binh will be a few hours behind us, we looked at a map to see where we could go hang out. Some place nice and fun, but not too nice and fun because we’d want Binh and Diem to enjoy that with us. We picked The Fushimi Inari Taisha Shrine, a Fox shrine, at the south east end of Kyoto, a bit more out of the way from the rest of the tourist spots.

When we arrived by train at around 4, most of the shops were winding down for the day. We thought we’d take a quick look around and then stop to shop afterwards. The shrine ground is quite vast. After a few initial shrine buildings we soon came upon a trail graced by big orange torii gates, there must be hundreds, or maybe even thousands, each sitting behind each other. The rows of torii gates seemed to go on and on.

We consulted the trail the map and thought it looked rather short. We’d be able to finish the entire trail before sundown for sure. So off we went. In the beginning, we took a lot of pictures. Stopping to take pictures every few feet or so, then as we went on, we got tired and had to put all of our focus on just taking the next step. That map was definitely not drawn to scale!

Fox shrine kitty

We walked and walked, petted a few cats we met along the way, I introduced Pocari Sweat (an Asian energy drink) to Jae and we walked some more. It wasn’t all just flat terrain; there were a lot of steps too. A good 30 minutes in, we came to the same trail map, this one had a big X marking the start of the trail, what?!?!?!? We just barely started?? Since we couldn’t read any of the text, we had no idea how long it was (later we found out it was about 4km long). At that point, the sun was getting ready to set and we pondered our next step.

Di, ‘We can do it! Let’s finish. We’re not quitters!’.
Me, ‘I dunno. This is already quite an accomplishment. For all we know, this could go on for miles!’
Jae,’Let’s go. Just finish this thing!’
Jason, …

So on we went. 10 minutes later we spotted a white cat. It sat a bit off to the side, just watching us. Jason tried to get the cat to come closer but instead it walked away, back towards where we came from. We took that as a sign to turn back. It was almost 5 anyhow and we didn’t’ want to be stuck there overnight where there doesn’t seem to be any light around to guide us.