It was our final morning in Kyoto before taking the bullet train to our next destination – Hakone. We checked out of our Airbnb really early, walked to the train station with all our luggage, stored our bags in the station lockers and took a bus to the Higashiyama district – which is known for its traditional streets, temples and shrines. We arrived just after 8am so the streets were really quiet and we were able to take some lovely photos.

^{Exploring the Higashiyama District}

We then set off to find Starbucks! The Starbucks in this area is often voted as one of the top 5 most beautiful Starbucks in the world. It was very beautiful from the outside so we decided to go in and have coffee and a cake. Unfortunately it was absolutely packed so we headed back out again!

We then climbed the hill to visit Kiyomizu-dera – a buddhist temple which provided lovely views over all of Kyoto.

^{Kiyomizu-dera with views over Kyoto}

^{Kiyomizu-dera}

By this stage it was only 10am but it was starting to get very busy. As we had a long journey ahead of us we decided to head back to the train station and see if we could catch an earlier bullet train. We walked down the hill passing the streams of people just arriving and stopped for a quick ice cream before catching the bus.

^{Ice creams}

At Kyoto station we were able to bring our train forward by an hour or so which gave us time to have a quick lunch. We found a Katsu restaurant where we had Katsu pork before setting off on our journey to Hakone. We loved Kyoto!