Postcards from Kyoto

I cannot believe how quickly a year has gone by. This time last year Lynsey and I were in the middle of getting off a plane from Kyoto, giddily exhausted by the five days we had just spent roaming around Japan’s old capital. We had gone a bit on a whim, realizing early in the school year we had a random five day weekend in May between a Korean bank holiday and Children’s Day. Departing via Busan and arriving in Osaka, we grabbed an airport bus to Kyoto and found our AirBnB. Since Lynsey had proposed the trip, I took a backseat and let her take care of what to see, eat, and do, handling our flights and accommodation instead. We’re both pretty calm travelers and don’t like rushing through sights or out the door in the morning, so we made a good team for fitting in what we wanted to explore and how fast (or in our case, slowly) we wanted to see them.

If you can’t tell, I prefer traveling with a friend or two. Sometimes bigger groups are fun, but if you don’t have the right combination of personalities, it can be pretty exhausting and tense. I was lucky the four girls I went to Thailand and Cambodia with were compatible because that trip could have turned pretty ugly at different points otherwise. I also don’t really love traveling solo, though I see its benefits and don’t mind doing so if I can’t find anyone to go with me. It’s not that fun making up terrible rap songs on your own ;) Anyhow, here are some postcards from Kyoto in celebration of the fact that it’s been one year since I was there! Can’t wait to see where May 1st takes me next year.

Check out my Kyoto guide here if you want to know more.

Words and Photographs by Samantha