Hiroshima

10th-12th February, 2007

We woke up nice and early ready for our Hiroshima trip. It was a public holiday on Monday so we were able to stay in Hiroshima longer. To get to Hiroshima you can either catch the slow train which would take 4 hours or you could take a Shinkansen (a bullet train) which would get you there in an hour. Of course the fast train is a little more expensive but when time is precious it is worth it.

We went to the station to wait for the Shinkansen. They travel at around 300km/hour by the way. I had never seen one before let alone been on one. I was looking forward to having a ride on it. I wasn’t really sure what to expect. While we were waiting we saw a shinkansen whiz past us. It was amazingly fast! It kind of caught us all by surprise and we all just had our mouths opened. It was so fast. I didn’t know what it would feel like being on one but I soon found out. It was actually very smooth. Although it was moving at 300km/hour it didn’t really feel any different to being on a plane except that it was a lot more roomier. We made it to Hiroshima in an hour. I just can’t believe how fast the Shinkansen travels. It was a great experience.

We needed to check into our hotel so we could leave our luggage there before we went exploring. Once we were all organised we set off for Peace Memorial Park which is where the first Atomic bomb was let off on top of innocent people.

Being in Peace Memorial Park was amazing. We were actually standing and walking around the area where the bomb was let off. I had very mixed feelings about being there. It was very sad seeing all the memorials around the area. We saw Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes. There were actually thousands of paper cranes around the area that people sent from all over the world. It was kind of eerie being there. The Peace Memorial Park area is very mellow and peaceful. There is an eternal flame lit up which will continue to burn until there are no more nuclear weapons. Once all the nuclear weapons in the world have been destroyed the flame will be put out. It was amazing to see and read about all the history that had happened in Hiroshima. I just couldn’t believe that the whole city had been wiped out and destroyed. The after effects of the bombing were even more devastating. It actually affected many people for years. We walked around the A-Dome which was one of the buildings that withstood the bomb. The building must have been pretty strong to be able to continue standing.



We went into the Museum which explained the whole tragedy. It was very emotional going in there. We all just wondered along on our own so we could take in all the information. It was horrible seeing everything that happened. There was one section that was quite gory and graphic. They had displayed some people’s belongings which were found after the bombing. Some of the things included: clothes, shoes, watches which had stopped at 8:15 which was when the bomb went off, lunch boxes where the contents inside were charcoal, hair, fingernails, skin, notebooks tricycles and all sorts of other things. There was a story that went with every item. It was very depressing to see it all because a lot of it belonged to children. Lots of people actually managed to walk to their home after the bomb to be with their families before they died.

Although it was very depressing to see and hear about the tragedy that happened on 6th August, 1945 at 8:15am I am glad that I was able to see what actually happened. The Museum was very detailed which was good.

It is now about 62 years later and Hiroshima is an amazing place – very alive and established again. It is a very clean and beautiful city and one that I definitely recommend people go to.

After dinner Marie, Lauren and I decided to explore some of the 4000 pubs in Hiroshima. It took us an hour to actually find the one that we were looking for. It was called ‘Mac’ and it played English music. It was good to hear some familiar music. The pub itself was ok but the music was really good. We had a little dance but not as much as I wanted to. We are still yet to find a place to dance in properly. I found 500 yen in ‘Mac’ so that made us happy. We took our findings and decided to leave. We had to get up early the next morning to go to Miyajima.

MIYAJIMA

The day started with a buffet breakfast in the hotel. It was a very different buffet to what we are used to. Instead of the usual bacon, eggs, croissants, hotcakes……we got rice filled seaweed, Japanese style pastries, yoghurt and there was cereal and toast if you wanted it. It was a really nice breakfast and as usual I ate way too much. It kept me going for a while though.

Miyajima is a small island about 1 hour away from Hiroshima. We needed to take the ferry to get there. When we arrived on the island we discovered that there were deer roaming freely on the island. It was quite interesting to see. I was scared of them of course. They actually come up to you and if you are holding a plastic bag or paper or food they will try and take it out of your hands. It’s pretty funny – Marie was looking at the map and one of the deer bit a chunk out of her map. They must like the taste of paper.

There are a lot of things to look at on the island. There is the famous Tori for starters which is a red gate situated in the water. That was pretty amazing to see. We actually got pictures of it when we first arrived and then again at sunset - very beautiful.
There were also some shrines on the island to look at as well as a five-storied pergoda. There are only 5 five-storied pergoda’s in Japan and so far I have seen 2 of them. There is also a Mountain on the island which you take the cable car to get to. It has lots of monkeys and deer on it. These monkeys and deer just roam around freely. The monkeys are pretty entertaining really – they climb all over things and I saw a couple of them jump onto a pole from a roof and slide down them like firemen. They are pretty funny to watch. From this Mountain Marie and I walked to another Mountain called Mt Misen. We didn’t have much time left so the others decided not to walk to it but Marie and I were determined to get to it so we pretty much ran the whole way there and back so that we didn’t miss the last cable car. I’m glad that I got to the top though – the view was fabulous. We were pretty worn out when we got back.





We saw a monkey show and there was this monkey who could do all sorts of fantastic tricks like ride a bike, walk on stilts, collect all the money that people threw and put it into the box. It was brilliant. This monkey was pretty smart. We only started watching it half way through the show so we didn’t get to see all of it which was a bummer.

For dinner we ate ‘okonimiyaki’ which is famous in Hiroshima. Each city has it’s own style of it so we had to try it here. It is like a pancake filled with cabbage, meat and vegetables – in Hiroshima they put noodles in it too. I enjoyed it. The Oyster Festival was also on this weekend at Miyajima so there were lots of stalls selling barbequed oysters. Of course I had to try some – they were delicious.

After we got back from Miyajima we decided to hit the pubs again to see what else we could find. We seemed to be doing a lot of wondering – we went into a few pubs but didn’t like the look of them so walked out and then we went to one called ‘The Shack’. It was like a pub that sold food. We just ordered some drinks and ate some fries with it. Fries are something that I haven’t had for a while so instead of just eating one basket we ate two. ☺ We got home around 12:30am because we had an early start again the next morning.

THE CASTLE AND GARDEN

We woke up to another Japanese style buffet breakfast. It was just as delicious as the first day. I filled up before we set off to look at the Hiroshima Castle and the Shukkeien Gardens.

The castle had been rebuilt as it was destroyed in the bomb. They rebuilt it with a museum inside. It was quite modern looking inside. I think it is about 50 years old. It was interesting to look at some of the samuri swords which were very old. I still don’t think anything beats the Himeji Castle as that castle remains as it was.

The Shukkeien Gardens were very beautiful and peaceful. I really enjoyed walking around them. There was this little bridge in the middle of the garden which looked awesome.
It was quite steep to walk over it. We stayed there for a couple of hours enjoying the scenery.






After the gardens we went to this huge department store and found some lunch. There were many restaurants to choose from. I ate Korean food. It was very tasty. We had a quick look at the shops and then it was time to head back to the Shinkansen to go back to Himeji. It was a very full on weekend but I enjoyed everything about it.