[Pumpkin Pie]

We were in Japan in May. We found the JR pass invaluable travelling around Tokyo on the JR Yamanote line. Only used the metro once or twice. We did not use the pass within Kyoto but travelled to Nara, Hiroshima etc. from Kyoto with it.

With regard to the Imperial Palace & Gardens (if you don’t already know this) check you are not planning to go on a day it is closed (like we did)!

Personally I would give the Kyoto Tower a miss. We went up at night because we were given a half price ticket voucher from our hotel but it was really busy at the top and we left after about 5 minutes. We preferred the view from the top of Kyoto Station. Not as high but it’s free with plenty of room to walk about.

We had no problems finding toilets and they were always very clean. We also had no problems with insects at all and we were in lots of Japanese gardens - I guess it depends on the time of year.