Japan - The Rest

The rest of the days spent in Japan included visits to Hiroshima and Miyajima. Once again taking the Shinkansen south we first went to Hiroshima, which is renowned almost worldwide because of the Atomic Bomb dropped there during the second world war. I really didn't know what to expect by going there, but images of a post-apocalyptic city flashed across my mind. I didn't know how much damage still existed in the city at all. Turns out there are no remainders or leftovers from the blast, because the Atomic Bomb basically levelled almost an entire city causing the Japanese to have to start from scratch in rebuilding. The only artifact that remains in the City Hall, which is fenced off and held up by a steel frame.

Its kind of an odd thing to stand in front of such a building, especially when all the surrounding landscape is so nice. It stands right in front of a river, and there are trees and flowers growing all around. We made a visit to the Hiroshima musuem as well which is there to educate everybody on the devastion atomic warfare can cause.

Next on the agenda was taking a ferry across the bay to the tropical island of Miyajima. The ferry ride only took about 15 minutes so its not exactly far away, but Miyajima seemed a world away from Hiroshima. Miyajima is considered a national park, so most of the island is natural forests with fairly large mountains making up the rest. There were a lot of tame wild deer once again who wander around the town, looking for snacks from tourists. There were also an amazing amount of tourist gift stores, with basically entire streets devoted to such. After a bit of a trek around the beach and up along the trails, we checked into a Ryokan which is a traditional Japanese building offering dinner, a bed and breakfast in the morning. The building is laid out all traditionally, with the silk screen doors and bamboo mats. Even the beds are the roll out bamboo matresses. For dinner you are supplied with all the traditional robes, and it is quite the experience to get dressed up and served a very fancy traditional Japanese dinner.

The dinner was good, but took a little to get used to, even for one that enjoys most Japanese food. There were portions of all kinds of raw fish, as well as different slightly pickled shellfish. Also served were giant oysters, sea bass and hot sake to go along. There were many courses in the meal and it was very well presented. The people running the Ryokan were very nice as well, and it was an elderly woman that served us most of the dinner and sat to talk for quite awhile, which was a very personal touch. I'd recommend staying at a Ryokan for anyone travelling to Japan, its well worth it.

The rest of the time on Miyajima was spent exploring, as well as climbing up the towering mountain which took quite some time. There were supposed to be wild monkeys up there as well, but the sign said on both days that they had gone back to the forest to eat. Maybe its just as well, because the warning signs showed some interesting pictures of monkeys stealing things and attacking people. Okay, maybe not attacking people but that doesn't rule out the possibility of it happening.

After a couple of days on Miyajima we slowly made it back to Kyoto to spend another night, before heading to the floating airport for me to head back to Canada. It sure was an action packed trip, and it left me quite exhausted once I finally arrived back. Japan turned out to be totally different from what I was expecting, in a good way, and was well worth the experience. It was such a nice place I'd even consider living there, but of course without knowing the language things could get a little worn thin after awhile. Japan certainly seems to know what its doing with managing such a large population, and it was nice to see what level of precision everything runs to over there. It makes most the western world look sloppy and lazy in comparision. So ends my series on the trip to Japan!