As with K-On!, I went around as a tourist, not specifically out to make accurate comparisons, and the photos just happened to match… or they don’t even match. I “cheated” on some, for example, the bus is just a regular bus, going to Mt Fuji instead of Kyoto.
The pair of images below are of Tokyo Big Sight, where large events are held, such as Comiket (in Japan, more commonly referred to as Comike).
Kyoto
The shots of the river are at the wrong point of the river. The actual location should be a few kilometres up the river. The river is called the Kamo River and has bridges every few hundred metres.
Kyoto Animation
I was originally planning to go to Kyoto Animation on the way to other shrines and temples, but it’s actually not on the way to anywhere. It’s not that far though, only a few stops past Fushimi Inari Taisha. One tip for Fushimi Inari: it’s probably better go to Fushimi Inari last because if you plan on doing the whole walk, it will take the better part of the day and you probably won’t have time (or be too tired) for anything else afterwards. A lot of places in Kyoto have last entry at 4pm (or even 3:30pm) and it takes forever to get anywhere because the buses are so slow.
The Kyoto Animation building is a yellow building on the west side of Kohata Station (JR Nara line) (oh I guess my earlier statement was wrong, it’s on the way to Nara). I actually caught the Keihan train to similarly named Kowata Staion, because there are no JR stations on the east side of Kyoto where I was staying. The KyoAni Shop is in a brown brick building on the west of Kowata station. It’s important not to confuse the two. The office building is a private office and you’re not allowed inside. You can try to talk to the staff if you feel brave enough.
The KyoAni Shop is a small shop, but it’s surprising how much small Japanese shops can hold. Sometimes in anime shops around Japan there is a small “KyoAni Shop” section with a limited selection of KyoAni goods, so what’s sold in the “official” shop isn’t exclusively sold there, however the small sections elsewhere are hard to find and might not have what you want. I’m not sure if there are other “official” shops like this one. The shop was on the second floor, although I’m not sure why the sign outside the building has Kyoto Animation taking up the whole third floor. Maybe I’m missing something. For reference, it is open from 10am to 6pm every day, and until 4pm sometimes (the writing is too small on my photo). It’s best to check their website though. When you’re organising things, you don’t think of these details and you might end up going and it’s closed, or if you want to find out, there’s nowhere that you can find out. I went on a Sunday which could have been bad considering opening hours, but it was the only real chance I had considering my schedule. Also, opening at 10am was a bit late because I had to rush off to Toyosato afterwards so it would be past midday before I reached Toyosato (I actually missed the train which comes once an hour so I arrived at 1pm). It was okay in the end because there’s not much to do at Toyosato (more on Toyosato in another post).
Nara
There’s always something under renovation. The renovations often take years, for example the famous Himeji Castle has been under renovation since 2010, and they’re planning to finish this year. A regular business wouldn’t be able to stop business for four years.
Washinomiya
I recommend going here when there’s a festival. Festival dates are listed on their website. It’s hard to schedule your holiday to coincide with specific dates though, so you might not have a choice. I think the New Year festival is the biggest. It’s been many years since Lucky Star aired, so I’m not sure how crowded it will be but from news websites there have still been a considerable amount of Lucky Star fans. This article says 470,000 people visited the shrine for New Year 2014. I went on the 4th April 2013 and there were about 5 people in total.
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