Café Expedition XII

www.cafenoinah.com 
hamburger steak bagel 700¥

Café Noinah. Interesting place with kind of South American vibe. Nice cozy atmosphere and good food. This place is located in norht west Kyoto, an area I haven't spent so much time in so it was interesting to discover new places in this area.

Photos of Oteki

Some days ago I posted the first half of this photoshoot we did with Oteki and Kazuya. Here are the photos of Oteki (and the photos of Kazuya you can find here). I really enjoyed these photos and especially the ones with windy hair. Oteki has such a cool and interesting face! 

Photos: Esa Naukkarinen 

Photo assistant : Kazuya 

Model: Oteki

Café Expedition XI

www.blow-works.com/near 
hazelnut flawored milk 500¥
caramel icecream 350¥
lotus root chips 400¥
salmon avocado salad 650¥


Café dining Near. Cozy underground space with a gallery. Once again we startesd with the sweets, and after few hours continued with a proper lunch. This was also an ideal place for lazy working and just spending the rainy day.

The food here was actually quite nice, and I had plenty since Linn made sad mistake with her order and well, I ended up eating her dish too. But over all nice place near us so maybe we will end up there again.

Long time no hear

It has been a while! I can't keep up how fast the days and weeks just passes by! It is already July and that is horrible! Here I still have school until the beginning of August (meanwhile people back in Finland already lives their summer vacations) and this is the busy time when you realize that you actually have to do something for all the classes your taking. I haven't really told about my school stuff from this semester but that I will do later, since maybe you have already seen the pictures above this text waiting to be introduced.

Well well for long time I have wanted to take photos of my two friends Oteki and Kazuya. Some weeks ago we finally found a day that fits for all of us and headed to the studio of our school. Even though I usually let the ladies go first, the pictures of Oteki with wind in her hair I'll keep to my self just a bit longer and start with photos of Kazuya.

And also I finally made a Tumblr account to share some random photos of mine!

You can find it >> here <<

Sunday Café Expedition X

www.secondhouse.co.jp 
Almond cake 420¥
Mango tapioka pudding 380¥
blueberry creamcheese cake 400¥

Second House café. These Sunday café expeditions are really starting to be more like Wednsdays expeditions. This time the place was all about cakes, and I can still remember the face of the waitress when I ordered three cakes at once. The café also has an open kitchen so you can see when the cakes are being made. With Nina, Linn, Mew and Phu we spent almost six hours in this café so it's kind of a record for us. Well the heavy rain outside also had something to do with it. The mango tapioka pudding was great!

Sunday Café Expedition IX

www.madoi-co.com/food/bon-boncafe 
Beef stake with black pepper 900¥
Lemon squash 350¥

Bon Bon café. This was the first time we tried this café located very near to us. Great "old days" atmosphere and nice furnishing. Once again we went to the café a bit late so we ordered some dinner. The dishes were a bit small to be a proper dinner but the taste was good and simple. The drink list was actually very cheap which means this would be an ideal place for a cup of coffee (or in my case something else) and just enjoy the nice atmosphere with a good book or a friend. Also the girl working there was really cute.  

Night at the city

Finally some of the photos we took with Shiho two weeks ago. We had to wait until 1am to get the streets of Shijo a bit more empty before we could start. The idea was to use the lights of the streets and play with the reflections. We strolled around the area and stopped for interesting locations. Shiho were great as always and we had a lot of fun. Around 5 o'clock we were done and enjoyed a beautiful sunrise at the kamogawa river.

Sunday Café Expedition VIII

www.tamayuran.jp 
Hot chocolate 500¥
parfait with berries 450¥

Tamayuran cat café. Busy times with a lot of school work, so last weeks "Sunday" café actually happened on this Wednsday. We went to a small cat café, or more like a café with cats, since in this place there is no enterance fee and the cats are more relaxed.

This was my first time to visit a café with cats. It is funny to drink and eat while having a huge orange cat on your lap. The place had a home made atmosphere, good parfaits and cocoa and we saw four different cats, even though most of them were kind of hiding upstairs, where the owner might be living. Nice experience.

Up in the mountains

Trip to Kibune and Kurama. Before the rainy season started we wanted to visit some new outdoor place. We took a train up North, to the mountains. It was heavy 13km walk with Shrines and great scenery. Up and down a mountain, then up again and down once more.

With all the beauty of the nature, the best parts for me were the concrete structures holding the mountain togther.

It was the perfect combination of Jurassic Park, Lost and Miyazaki's films like Castle in the Sky. 

Sunday Café Expedition VII

www.sarasan2.exblog.jp 
Ginger ale with mango syrup 550¥
Caramel cheese cake 470¥

Sarasa Nishijin. For me this place isn't a new discovery, but still on top of my lists. The place used to be a public bath house, but it has been renovated to serve as a café. The original tiling and other elements left from the previous purpose makes the atmosphere really strong and interesting. Their cake and drink selection is quite wide (and good!) and the prices aren't that high. Perfct combination of interesting surroundings, delicious cakes and good atmosphere.

This place goes well with the Funaoka bath house near by. This Sunday we walked more than 13km at Kurama and Kibune and after that nothing felt more relaxing than good bath and café.