How To Get The Best Of Kyoto In One Day

When you visit Japan, Kyoto is one of the most beautiful city that you need to visit. Kyoto is divided into five parts, which are South, West, North, East and Central. But for me, I prefer to left out Central Kyoto and concentrated on the other four parts. Each of its parts has at least one must-visit-place because of its beauty. Because I never found someone who has tried to visit all of those places in one day, so I try to do it. I will try to explain in here based on my personal experience. First thing first. Is it possible? The answer is ‘yes, it is possible’. But is it recommended? The answer is ‘no, I don’t think so’. The distance it took from one place to another is quite long and so tiresome when you have to keep changing trains, and by the time you reached the final place, your leg probably has given up. But despite all that, I try to push myself and managed to complete it. 

The route that you’re going to take is like this 

North – West – South – East 

Kinkakuji – Arashiyama – Fushimi Inari – Kiyomizudera. 

1. You might want to check Kiyomizudera Website to know whether they are available to be visited at night. 

2. You might want to stay as close as you can to Kinkakuji. I stay at Kaede Guesthouse which took me some time to arrived there. To reached Kinkakuji, you have to take a bus from Kitaoji Bus Terminal which located in Kitaoji station (search Kyoto subway map) 

3. Spare about one hour, and because it’s going to be very crowded, you might want to go as early as possible 

4. To reach Arashiyama, you have to go back to Kitaoji station using the same bus from earlier, and go to Uzumasa-Tenjingawa station. After that you have to come out from the station to walk to Randen-Tenjingawa Station which is located in the surface (not underground) and head to Arashiyama station. 

5. You can spend one and a half hour in here, there are many shops which might make you stop for a while. And you can go to Arashiyama Bamboo forest. Follow the path. 

6. You might want to head to Saga Arashiyama Station to reach your next destination. You can go to the station by bus or on foot. If you decided to take a bus, you still need to walk about 17 minutes to the station, and if you decided to walk, it’s going to take 22 minutes. Since the difference is only 5 minutes between going by bus and on foot, so we decided to go to the station on foot while try to enjoy the city. 

7. Head to Inari Station. You might have to switch train in Kyoto Station. 

8. Fushimi Inari is more like a mountain, there are several gates through the top. I personally didn’t go to the top and quite satisfied with just only several of them. 

9. Walk to Fushimi-inari Station (Fushimi-Inari Station is different than Inari station which you arrived before) and head to Kiyomizu-gojo. 

10. By this time you might recognize that it’s already dark, and if you go when they have special night opening hours, you can visit it, because Kiyomizudera closed at 5.00 PM, and guest needs to buy another ticket to access it at night. 

11. From Kiyomizu-gojo, you might need to walk about 12 minutes to arrive at Kiyomizudera. It’s going to be quite tiresome because the track is uphill. 

Optional 

12. After spending some time in there, you can choose to go back to Tokyo immediately. There are some overnight bus such as Willer Express which depart from Kyoto Station at night. Therefore you have just save some time and money. I did that, and you just have to push yourself to sleep and get as much rest as you can on the bus because you need to explore Tokyo on the next day. 

And just to remember that this was what I've done when I went to visit Kyoto. You can modify it as much as you can.