WESTERN JAPAN – HIMEJI, HIROSHIMA AND MIYAJIMA
After paying our respects to Fuji-san and Nikko, we started heading down South. In order to break the journey up into smaller chunks, we stopped by a couple places in Western Honshu first, specifically Himeji (one of the top three castles in Japan), Okayama (one of the top three gardens), Hiroshima (the location of the first atomic bomb) and Miyajima (one of the top three shrines).
Our itinerary for the 4 weeks in Japan:
Super-fast Shinkansen
One of the symbols of modern Japan is the Shinkansen, also called the bullet train, which is a network of high-speed trains that connect the country North to South at a speed of up to 320 km/h. Unfortunately, not only is it very fast, it is also quite expensive – luckily there are weekly passes, as explained in our last post, available for tourists, which you can only buy abroad before you arrive in Japan. Nevertheless, it was refreshing being able to travel this quickly (6-7 times as fast as our Colombian buses) and punctually (trains leave on the exact second of departure). Besides simply shortening the distances, the fact that the next big city is a short hop away must surely also increase the feeling that you are part of the same community!
1. STOP: HIMEJI
Castles and Cherry Blossoms
Our first journey on the Shinkansen was on our way from Tokyo to Himeji, which is home to one of Japan’s few originally preserved castles and an amazing garden for viewing cherry blossoms, which were in full bloom by the time we got there. Sadly, the vast majority of castles were destroyed in the late 1800’s to prevent them being a base for potential rebels, but a lot were rebuilt to original specifications in the past 30-40 years, Due to the cherry blossoms, unfortunately, there was such a big crowd (even on a Monday) that we gave up trying to enter the castle after having waited for an hour in line, with no end in sight. Nevertheless, the view from the outside and the gardens were worth the entrance ticket by itself – it’s no surprise that it is considered to be amongst the top 3 castles in Japan (although it might be less impressive without the cherry blossoms). Being sakura season, the castle was also open for a few hours in the evening for a free concert. Listening to the two ladies in traditional kimono play the piano and the ocarina to a backdrop of the illuminated castle and Japanese paper lanterns amidst cherry blossoms was surely one of the most special moments of our stay in Japan!
Apart from the castle, we visited the stunning garden, Koko-en, where the samurai quarter used to be. Now it`s a reconstruction with waterfalls, ponds and some lovely building in a zen environment.
Love Hotel Luxury
Accommodation in Japan comes in a very wide variety of styles – there is even a separate chapter on it in our guidebook! Besides what I call the “sardine can room” which we’ve already mentioned in Tokyo, there are the ryokan (traditional Japanese inns with half-board) and the famous capsule hotels (where you basically sleep in coffins stacked on top of each other – while we wanted to try this too, they were surprisingly all fully-booked online as it`s relatively unexpensive). One less-known option is the “love hotel”, an establishment where rooms are typically rented by the hour to couples in need of some privacy. Surprisingly, visiting a love hotel is considered perfectly normal, even for married couples who want to spend some time away from their tiny flat (or their children). The rooms are very spacious (and soundproofed), with huge beds and a nice bathroom – and sometimes the whole hotel has a quirky theme, like Hello Kitty or the Aquarium. In the original love hotels, the entrance and the exit is separated to avoid awkward situations where people leaving the building meet someone they know coming in; also once you leave the building (e.g. to get dinner) there is no way back in without paying again. However, some establishments also try to target normal travellers, and besides the “short stay” rates, also offer “rest” packages which allow you to stay the whole night and return after having a dinner out.
When we were looking at accommodation in Himeji, we found one such hotel, which was offering luxury accommodation at rock-bottom prices to fill up empty space on a weekday night. Renata was a bit sceptical at first about the level of cleanliness we should expect, but I convinced her that this was an authentic Japanese experience that we couldn’t miss! The hotel (Hotel Fine) was located on the edge of town (but still only a 30-minute bus ride away from the centre), along with a dozen similar establishments, with names like Baby Kiss and Mon Cherie. Our room must have been over 10 times the size of our hole in Tokyo (for a lower price), and had mood lighting and a karaoke system, not to mention our own massage chair, slot machine, jacuzzi, two fridges and a vending machine that sold sexy underwear. It was refreshing to have a nice place of our own after being squeezed in Tokyo, although it is hard to see how there can be such a vast difference in prices and value between these two places!
Food
As it has been requested by a few you we are adding a bit more info here about the Japanese food. We could even write a separate post on the topic, but probably that would be quite a dull post for some, therefore we`d rather try to squeeze in to each city or region a bit of our culinary experiences. In the order of the pictures below:
Of course, a ramen bowl with some udon noodle is often part of the everyday quick meals. It`s, as most meals, almost always served with mizo soup and green tea.
We had donburi, which is a bowl of cooked rice with something on top, in this case it was with fresh raw tuna and spring onion with wasabi.
Teriyaki is a stick with pieces of meat on it, which can be chicken, beef, pork or seafood, and is served with Japanese sauces.
In Himeji we came across with Okonomiyaki for the first time, which is a pancake filled with different ingredients, for instance cheese or vegetables. In Himeji they sold the version that is rolled up like the European pancake, while elsewhere it`s flat.
We also tried Taki Yaki, which is a pancake ball filled with a piece of octopus and covered in brown sauce, It`s very popular all round the country.
Most local sweets are filled with flavoured red bean paste. Now with sakura the cherry bloosom-flavoured option was the most popular.
2. STOP: Okayama Garden and Hiroshima Peace Park
Following Himeji, we headed to Hiroshima, but made a brief stop in Okayama to check out the famous garden there; it is one of the top 3 gardens in Japan. Apparently the Japanese have a top 3 list for everything (not only castles or even mountain castles, but also flatland mountain castles – don’t ask me what that is though)! The garden is a large green spot in the middle of the city next to the castle with ponds, bamboo gardens and of course many cherry trees, and therefore is a favourite place for families and couples taking their engagement and wedding photographs. We bumped into couples in traditional dresses and their photo team literally at every corner of the park.
Arriving in Hiroshima in the afternoon, we only had time for the main activity in the city, of visiting the Hiroshima Peace Park, created at the location where the first of two atomic bombs was used on 6 August 1945 to force Japan to surrender and end World War II. The park was a very striking memorial to the victims of the tragedy, actually, I much preferred it to the one we later saw in Nagasaki, particularly the skeleton remains of a domed building which was almost right below the blast and thereby partially survived as opposed to the remained of the neighbourhood which was completely destroyed.
A slightly less serious highlight of Hiroshima was the Okonomiyaki Village. The local version of okonomiyaki is a cross between an omelette and a pancake, with some cabbage, soya sprouts, ginger and preferably some bacon added for a bit more flavour. The ‘village’ is actually an old building that is full of little places that cook their own special version of the famous Hiroshima-style Okonomiyaki. The whole place has a really authentic vibe to it, with customers sitting around a counter made of metal, which is heated from underneath, and the chefs prepare your meal right in front of your eyes! I’m not sure whether it was due to the atmosphere, or the fact that this was my first okonomiyaki, but none of the other okonomiyaki I had in other cities could compare – so this is definitely something that should be on every visitor’s list when they go to Hiroshima!
3. STOP: The Floating Shrine of Miyajima
The floating shrine of Miyajima is one of the most well-known images of Japan, actually it is considered to be amongst the top 3 shrines in the country (Did I mention how Japanese seem to have a top 3 list for nearly everything?!?) It is on the outskirts of Hiroshima and not difficult to get to at all, the only challenge is timing your visit to be at high tide, so you can see the reflections of the majestic wooden tori (gate) and the shrine itself – otherwise all you’d see is a gate that has sunk into the mud. This is the time when locals collect oysters from the sand, which makes the local specialty in all imaginable form.
The shrine also stands on wooden sticks in the water, and is built up of a complex of red wooden buildings. We were lucky to arrive here when a traditional wedding ceremony was taking place with rice offerings and prays. It had a very different, a lot more serious atmosphere from a western-style wedding with the music and the official steps,
Besides the floating tori and shrine, the main attraction of Miyajima are the deer that freely roam around the village. While supposedly wild, they are completely used to tourists, so they are happy to come over to you and let you pet them, as long as they get something to eat in return. Beware though - if their trust turns out to be misplaced though, they are perfectly happy to avenge your betrayal by eating your map or your rail tickets!
After seeing the shrine and walking around on the village’s two streets, we had a quick lunch from their seafood specialties (asparagus and bacon-flavoured fishcakes for Renata and breaded oyster balls, a local specialty for me – yummy!), and then took off to walk around on the island. We arrived at the peak of the cherry blossoms here, so some of the paths were all covered in pink. There was a cable car taking people to the shrine at the summit of the mountain, but we decided to spend the money on ice cream and hike up instead. It was a tough 90-minute climb, and most of the people we met were coming downhill (some even stopped to express their respect for us going uphill), but the ice cream was a proper Italian gelato (rather than the soft ice cream they usually sell in Japan), and the view over the Seto Inland Sea was very rewarding too. We climbed down on the other part of the island with a detour to see some further beautiful shrines, one of them with more than 500 little Buddha statues!
Following these adventures in Western Japan, we continued to head South to warmer climates, to the island of Kyushu, which has consistently played an important part in Japanese history, including Nagasaki (one of the foundations of Japan’s industrialisation), Kagoshima (which played a leading role in ending feudalism and starting the country on the road to modernisation) and last-but-not-least Kumamoto (the setting of the Last Samurai for all you Tom Cruise fans out there, but more importantly also the birthplace of Kumamon, an extremely cute cartoon bear that was voted best mascot of the year in 2011). Tune in for our next edition to read more!