Kyoto in Momiji,
Season.

The head shrine of Inari, the deity of rice, sake and business, on a wooded hillside in southern Kyoto. Thousands of vermilion torii line the paths that climb Mount Inari behind it.

A small independent espresso bar near the foot of Fushimi Inari, run in the Australian and New Zealand cafe style that took hold in Kyoto over the past decade.

A Buddhist temple on the Higashiyama hillside, best known for a vast wooden veranda that projects out over the slope on a lattice of pillars.

A garden restaurant below Kiyomizu-dera serving yudofu, the Kyoto set meal of tofu simmered in a pot of hot water with sides of sesame, vegetables and pickles.

A tea house on Sannenzaka, the stepped stone lane of wooden shopfronts that runs down from Kiyomizu-dera towards Gion.

Kyoto's best known geisha district, a grid of wooden machiya teahouses and restaurants between Shijo street and the Kamo River.

A long-standing okonomiyaki restaurant in Gion, cooking on a hot steel counter in the Kansai style.

A walking path through a dense stand of moso bamboo in Sagano, on the western edge of Kyoto, between Tenryu-ji and the Okochi Sanso villa.

The head temple of the Tenryu branch of Rinzai Zen, in Arashiyama, with a pond garden laid out to borrow the mountains behind it as part of the view.

The Arashiyama branch of % Arabica, a Kyoto coffee company with a minimal white counter and a wall of glass facing the Katsura River.

A soba restaurant beside the Katsura River in Arashiyama, milling and cutting its own buckwheat noodles, with river views from the upper floor.

A Zen temple in north west Kyoto whose three-storey pavilion, covered in gold leaf, stands at the edge of a large pond. Its formal name is Rokuon-ji.

A covered market street five blocks long, one shop deep, running parallel to Shijo in central Kyoto and known as Kyoto's kitchen.

A Zen temple at the foot of the eastern hills, properly called Jisho-ji, with a two-storey wooden pavilion, a moss garden and a garden of raked white sand.

A stone path along a narrow canal in the eastern hills, running roughly two kilometres between Ginkaku-ji and the Nanzen-ji area.

A branch of the American roaster Blue Bottle, in a converted machiya, the traditional Kyoto wooden townhouse, near Nanzen-ji.

A yudofu restaurant in the grounds beside Nanzen-ji, serving simmered tofu courses in wooden buildings set in a garden.

A large Zen temple complex at the foot of the eastern hills, with a huge two-storey gate and a red brick Meiji-era aqueduct running straight through the grounds.

A Buddhist temple in the eastern hills, formally Zenrin-ji, built up a wooded slope with halls linked by covered wooden walkways.

Pontocho is a narrow pedestrian lane running between Shijo and Sanjo, packed with restaurants, many of them serving kaiseki, the Kyoto multi-course meal built around the season.

The morning rail run from Kyoto Station down to Nara, served by two competing operators with different stations at the far end.

A Buddhist temple on the hill above Sarusawa Pond in central Nara, with a five-storey pagoda, an octagonal hall and a museum of early Buddhist sculpture.

A vast Buddhist temple in Nara whose main hall houses a fifteen metre seated bronze Buddha, the Daibutsu.

A large public park in central Nara, wooded and open, with around a thousand wild sika deer moving freely between the temples and shrines inside it.

A long-established kamameshi restaurant in Nara, serving rice steamed to order in small cast iron pots with toppings laid over the top.

A vermilion Shinto shrine at the foot of a sacred forested hill in Nara, approached through a long avenue of moss-covered stone lanterns.

A kakinoha-zushi shop and restaurant in Naramachi, the old merchant quarter of low wooden houses south of the main temples.

A small specialty coffee roaster in central Kyoto, in a converted wooden building behind a car park a short walk from Nishiki Market.

A temple south of Kyoto Station whose five-storey pagoda, at about 55 metres, is the tallest wooden pagoda in Japan.

The head temple of the Otani branch of Jodo Shinshu Buddhism, a short walk north of Kyoto Station, with two enormous wooden halls.

A ramen shop by the east side of Kyoto Station, serving a dark soy-based broth loaded with spring onion and slices of pork.

Kyoto's main station and its Shinkansen stop, on the Tokaido line between Osaka and Tokyo.