Uji Matcha Morning + Nara — One Day Trip from Kyoto

Kyoto Station

📍 Kyoto

The day trip starts and ends at your Kyoto base — ride out to Uji in the morning.

Byodoin Omotesando

📍 Uji

Uji is Japan's matcha heartland. The street up to the temple is lined with tea shops handing out tastings — matcha soba, matcha soft serve, matcha everything.

Byodo-in Temple

📍 Uji

At the end of the tea street, standing over its own reflection: Byōdō-in, the Phoenix Hall. If you have a 10-yen coin in your pocket, look at it — this is the building on it.

Uji River

📍 Uji

Matcha soba or a riverside lunch before heading to Nara.

Nara Park

📍 Nara

The free-roaming deer — they bow, actually bow, for the shika senbei crackers you buy from the stalls. Buy one pack; they will find you.

Todai-ji

📍 Nara

The Great Buddha Hall — one of the largest wooden buildings on earth.

Ukimido Pavilion

📍 Nara

Hexagonal pavilion out on the pond — lovely at golden hour, then ride back to Kyoto.