Kyoto

Kyoto is the cultural soul of Japan. For over a thousand years, from 794 to 1868, it served as the imperial capital, and in that millennium it accumulated an artistic and spiritual heritage that no other Japanese city can match. The numbers alone are staggering: 17 UNESCO World Heritage Sites, over 2,000 temples, 400 shrines, dozens of traditional gardens, and entire districts of preserved machiya (wooden townhouses) where geiko (Kyoto's geisha) still glide between teahouses in the lantern-lit streets of Gion.

The city moves to a rhythm set by the seasons. Spring brings cherry blossoms that transform the philosopher's path and Maruyama Park into tunnels of pink and white petals. Summer is lush and humid, alive with Gion Matsuri, one of Japan's greatest festivals, when enormous floats are paraded through the city streets. Autumn sets the temple gardens ablaze in crimson and gold, with illuminated night viewings at Tofuku-ji and Eikan-do. Winter dusts the bamboo groves and rock gardens with snow, revealing minimalist beauty at its most profound.

Kyoto also rewards the traveler who looks beyond the famous sites. The Nishiki Market, known as Kyoto's Kitchen, stretches for five blocks of food stalls selling pickles, tofu, wagashi sweets, and matcha everything. The craft tradition is alive in workshops producing Kyo-yuzen silk dyeing, Kiyomizu pottery, and handmade washi paper. And the kaiseki cuisine, a multi-course culinary art form born in Kyoto's Zen monasteries, represents perhaps the highest expression of Japanese gastronomy.