My second day in Hiroshima wasn’t really in Hiroshima. I went to Miyajima (jima means island) because there is a really famous shrine there – Itsukushima. It was raining, which wasn’t really ideal. I took a train about 20 minutes outside of Hiroshima to get Miyajima-guchi. About 5 minutes from the station was the ferry dock. The ferry runs every 20 min and takes 10 min to get to the island. The island is very beautiful, mountains and lots of forest. As the ferry approached I saw the famous Toshii gate. It’s one of the most photographed images in Japan. Basically the gate is the entrance to the shrine and the shrine is built above water. At low tide you can walk up to the gate and at high tide the gate is surrounded by the sea and the shrine appears to be floating in the water. It was really beautiful. I felt really lucky because I was able to see it at low and high tide. Anway, as the day was rainy it was also very foggy, which only added to the mystical feel of the place. Miyajima, incidentally, has the world’s largest rice scooper. Seriously. It’s like the size of a small house. I walked around the island, frolicked with the deer (there are hundreds of tame deer that come up to you), ate tempura udon, visited the 5 story pagoda, and went to the shrine. All in all it was a really lovely afternoon. Miyajima is by far the most beautiful thing I have done in Japan. I will definitely go back. There are hotels on the island, so next time I think I’ll stay and go hiking, there are tons of trails in the forest that lead to all the different shrines (there are about 30 on the island, but I only went to Itsukushima). Anyway, for folks thinking of coming to Japan this is the most beautiful place I’ve experienced.
I never saw the deer when I went there. But I did see the monkeys. The trip sounds amazing. I am envious. The whole time I was reading your Hiroshima posts, I wanted to be right there.