Hi,
I was in Kyoto last year looking for some good knives and jnats.
I was at Aritsugus Store in the Nishiki Market and they had a few nice stones for moderate (but not cheap) prices. But I think the store and the knives alone are worth a visit.
A short walk from Fushimi Inari shrine there is the store of Furata. They had some interesting stones for very good prices, but mostly unmarked and the communication was a bit difficult, but maybe if you now your jnats very well, you can make a nice deal there.
My best bargain was a huge Hideriyama Koppa (good quality, very homogenous and nice shape, about 3kg for 13 000 Yen, I use it a lot) stone I bought from a tool dealer at the junction of Shiokoji Dori/ Aburanokoji Dori (quite big store with big "Makita"-signs in the store front). They had a small selection of good synth. Stones and diamond plates (normal prices I would say) and a few very nice jnats. The perfectly shaped stones are (I would say) normal price, but the Koppas (they had only Hideriyama I think) are really cheap there
But also had a few very nice handmade (and sometimes very expensive) kiridashis, hammers and so on... kitchenknives only standard stuff like Fujiwara FKM, Tojiro and so on.
Have a nice trip and be sure to get some decent Yakitori there :hungry:
(at the big juction around the corner is a nice Yakitori joint)
Regards, Iggy