Kyoto is so pleasant, so varied, so accessible, and so open that a few days here yield delights readily.
Yesterday, for example, I visited a brewery in the southern district of the city. A sake brewery that has added the manufacture of beer to its repertoire, the company produces small batches of micro-brewed beer from hops and malt imported from Germany and Canada. The results are delicious. Visitors are welcome. Kizakura.
Later in the day we walked to a favorite, old soba shop in the center of town, hidden in an alley, where for $12 one has bowls of good broth, fresh noodles, and a choice of duck, prawns, fried tofu, or yam: Misoka-an Kawamichi-ya.
A bath in a big, sunken tub, a nap, cocktails at Touzan, and then back to Gion.
Obanzai is a winter stew specific to Kyoto, and we enjoyed a version in a hole-in-the-wall: Yasukawa. No sign, sliding door.
This late morning we board the train back to Tokyo.