Japan, Day 9

Sunday, November 19, 2006

For the first time ever, I got to sleep in on our trip. Okay maybe only until about 9:30 a.m. or so, but that's a lot later than the rest of our trip. Dad and I weren't too hungry and the Chans had to head to Nagasaki soon, so we went off on our own to see Kintai Bridge and Iwakuni Castle.

We took a relatively short JR ride to Iwankuni and then took a cab to the bridge. The bridge was originally built in 1674, and is famous for it's very interesting architecture. It was destroyed by a typhoon in 1950, but was rebuilt in the exact same form in 1953.

The cab driver let us off at one end of the bridge, and we had to pay for a round trip ticket so that we could walk across it. Despite having rained pretty hard that morning, the bridge wasn't slippery at all. There are steps on the really steep parts of it, so it's not as hard as it looks to walk on. Even though it was still drizzling there was quite a crowd.

On the other side, there was a small park with a bunch of fountains, and we could see Iwakuni Castle up on the hillside.

Sorry for the crappy photo, it's from Wikipedia. It looks nicer up on the hillside than the picture shows.

Up close, this is what it looks like:

Originally, we wanted to get to Miyajima, so we did not plan on visiting the castle, but it looked so cool that we decided just to go for it. In order to get to the castle, there is a pathway that goes up the hillside that looked incredibly daunting. The other option is to do what we did--take the tram up the hill. It's pretty scary; I'm afraid of heights so it was even worse, but we got a very nice view of the city from above:

At the end of the tram ride, there is a short walk up the rest of the hill to see the castle. We didn't have time to go inside, but it was a beautiful castle from the outside. It was built in that spot so that the family could have a view of the bridge and see any intruders into the city. The original was built during the Edo period, but then it was destroyed, so this is a replica built in the late 1900's. Kind of disappointing that it's not an original, but I guess that there was a time when all castles were supposed to be destroyed per the emperor.

We walked around for a few minutes and then headed back to try and get on the first tram back. Everyone packed very nicely into the tram and we were on our way back down... It was somewhere between the tram ride and getting on the JR to Hiroshima that we realized that Dad didn't have his camera. The bad news is that we lost all of the photos he took, but the good news for you reading this blog is that from here on out you will be shown a greater quality and quantity of photos.

Dad and I stood around the JR station for a while, hoping that the cab driver would come back, but we think that the camera got stuck under the seat so he either didn't notice or that a tourist took it. I've heard that the Japanese are very good with things getting lost...Margaret said that one of her friends lost her wallet 3 times and each time it was returned with all of the money inside...So I think we're having the faith that it was a tourist.

We eventually gave up after an English-speaking cab driver had no luck going on the radios. Minus one camera, we headed back on the JR train to Hiroshima. In order to get to Miyajima, we had to take the JR ferry (yes, the pass works with it, too!), which was a short cab ride from our hotel.

I was hoping that the rainy weather would work for us, but everything was still packed with sightseers. This is the beautiful view of the mountainside from the ferry:

The shrine at Miyajima is called the Itsukushima Shrine. The red arch thing is called a torii, which welcomes visitors to the island. It's also an indicator that it is a Shinto Shrine.

During high tide, the water comes up to the top of those black marks, and make the shrine look like it's floating. The temple itself also looks like it's floating on the water during high tide, but when we were there it just looked like a building on stilts.

There wasn't much time to talk around, so we headed back through the small town to try and catch the next ferry back to Hiroshima. Unfortunately, I was too full from last night's Okonomiyake, otherwise I would have tried the oysters that Miyajima is famous for. We did buy a few more maple cookies though to see if there was a difference between the vendors and the cafeteria at the museum (there wasn't any difference that I noticed). The way that they make them is pretty cool, though, it's a huge metal press thing:

Dad also bought a few wooden rice paddles, which supposedly originate in that area. The wood is supposed to be better than other materials for scooping rice because it doesn't transfer flavors.

Another thing that Miyajima is famous for are the deer. They are EVERYWHERE. It said on Wikipedia that they are treasured creatures because they "guard" the shrine. I think they sometimes get violent because all of their horns were cut off. Pretty much anywhere you look, there is a group of deer plus a huge sign warning you not to touch them. The signs are in Japanese, but you get the idea pretty clearly from the pictures. Here are some of the deer we saw...They're cute from far away...

All of these pictures were taken really fast because we were in such a rush to get back to the hotel. When we finally got back, we had to rush to the Shinkansen to get to Kyoto. The train ride was nice as usual, but we were so exhausted that by the time we arrived at our "Ryokan," a traditional Japanese-style hotel, we didn't even have enough energy to look around. I passed out on my futon as soon as my head hit the pillow.