Whenever I dreamt of Japan, I dreamt of the cherry blossoms in full bloom. Sure, I wanted to see the country in full too, but ultimately, in my mind Japan and the beautiful pink blooms were synonymous. And so, I planned a trip with this must-see bucket list priority in mind. It’s no surprise that the cherry blossoms lived up to their hype but as the country unfolded all its nooks and crannies, I fell more and more in love.

My Japan itinerary spanned across two full weeks on the ground, covering places such as: Tokyo, Nikko, Osaka, Kyoto, Miyajima, Nara and Shibu Onsen. The schedule was perfect for my first trip but if I was to tweak something, it would be the addition of a day or two to my stay in Osaka and another 24 hours saved for Kyoto. More on both of those later.

Regardless, to say I was satisfied with my first visit to this beautiful and quirky country would be an understatement. My first encounter with Japan was Tokyo but I’ve refrained from revisiting my holiday in an itinerary aligned sequence. This first post on my love affair with the land of the rising Sun, is based on a day trip to Nara from Kyoto.

We stayed in Kyoto for three days and three nights and spent one day visiting the Fushimi Inari shrine in the morning. We got there bright and early to avoid the rapid rush of crowds that follows (post coming up) before taking an hour train to Nara, arriving by around 1pm with plenty of time to still explore.

Nara was the capital of Japan between 710-784 AD and is famous on two counts: housing the world’s largest wooden structure, the Todaiji Temple and giving Japan the friendliest deer, you’ll ever meet, with impeccable Japanese manners to boot. These not so little guys will bow to you as you give them food – staying true to the country’s stereotype of unmatched politeness.

The city carries both its famous offerings with pride and as we stepped off the bus near Nara park, we spotted a sea of stalls selling food and deer crackers. Loaded with the bait as well as some chilli rice crackers for myself, we began our hunt for these mystical bowing deer which were a far cry from our fearless and somewhat rowdy kangaroos you find in country NSW.

I’ll preface the upcoming anecdote with the admission that I am terrified of animals. Sure, they are cute, and I like them…from far, very far. But travel, the expense of air fares and the waste of annual leave, has a way of instilling courage that you never knew existed. So, this 2.0 version of me was okay in attempting to attract the deer to me as long as my attempts were ignored by the creatures. In my stronger moments – driven by my desire to get the #gram -- I even braved feeding one or two. But the issue arose when my bait of crackers attracted not one docile looking deer but a whole pack of them. That’s when you ditch the false bravado and do a runner, I say.

After feeding the deer and getting the photographic evidence to back myself, we headed to the Great Buddha Hall. As the name suggests, aside from being the world’s biggest wooden structure, the hall is also home to one of Japan’s largest bronze statue of Buddha. The statue was huge as advertised and impressive too but I remain partial to its Tian Tan counterpart in Hong Kong’s Lantau Island, due to its beautiful outdoor setting.

We wandered inside and read up on the history of the Buddha Hall before heading in search of lunch. If you're vegetarian like me, you need not worry as a restaurant called Rokumeien in the Todaiji compound serves Japanese food and also has an english vegetarian set menu. My set meal had Udon noodle soup, pickles, a soft tofu like dish made of sesame seeds, rice and tea. It was filling and a satisfying end to a fun day but of course, in keeping with the Buddhist surroundings, the flavour was fairly mild.

If you have one full day in Nara or don't get too distracted by the deer and cherry blossoms, there are plenty more temples in Nara as well as a museum to keep you busy. For us however, we had a fulfilling but exhausting, temple filled itinerary the day before, so we chose to take our Nara trip slow. 

My adventures with the deer of Nara is only a small snippet of Japan and you can expect plenty of equally romantic retellings of my time in the country to follow in future posts!