World Heritage sites, scaffolding and deer, oh my!

A few weeks ago, I took a week off of work and went on a trip with Kim and Crystal.

Our route:
Iiyama to Nagano (train)
Nagano to Kyoto (night bus)
Kyoto to Nara (train) and back to Kyoto
Kyoto to Amanohashidate (rental car) and back to Kyoto
Kyoto to Himeji (train)
Himeji to Hiroshima (bullet train)
Hiroshima to Miyajima (boat!) and back to Hiroshima (technically, Miyajima is part of Hiroshima)
Hiroshima to Osaka (bullet train)
Osaka to Nagano (bus)
Nagano to Iiyama (train)

whew!  sounds fun, right??  It was!

For reference (and for fun/cause it's awesome!) a map:

The right-most point is Iiyama, and the left/bottom is Hiroshima/Miyajima (practically on top of each other)

 Well...where to begin...we got to Kyoto at 5am or so and went to our hostel.  Used the secret key code to get inside and sat there and just relaxed a bit and ate some freshly-purchased convenience store breakfast.

And then straight to Nara we go!  Hop on a train, a bus and voila, deer park!  DEER!  (Deer place #1) You can feed them!  Or rather, if you don't feed them, they will eat your clothes/papers/anything.

I feed a deer.

Big Buddha likes to get high fives!

The temple where the big Buddha is is a World Heritage Site (WHS #1)

ok...from Nara back to Kyoto.  We went to a castle in Kyoto, but I am not going to put a picture.

Next day...we rented a car (gasp!) and drove(double gasp!!!) to Amanohashidate.  It took about 2 hours to get there.  Amanohashidate is one of the "three scenic views of Japan".  And it was AMAZING!

"WTF?"  I hear you thinking.  Well...supposedly if you stand on the pedestool thing and look through your legs (see image) it will look like a bridge to heaven.  Well...go sometime and see for yourself, I don't want to spoil it!

At the view station where we were, there was a small amusement park.  It had a ferris wheel and this bike track thing where you could pedal around once for some fantastic views and that wonderful feeling of...being on a bike track in the sky!

Descend from the view station and you can walk along the sandbar itself.  You will also find a sign that proves this is one of the scenic views of Japan.

On the bridge/sandbar.  BEACH!  woo!  I got sand in my shoes.

 Drive back to Kyoto.

Next day...off to Himeji, WHS#2!!  And Scaffolding #1 

Only in Japan do they paint a picture of the building on the scaffolding.  We were fully aware that Himeji castle was under construction.  We went anyway, and it was still beautiful.

Continuing on from Himeji (we only stopped there a few hours)...Hiroshima!  These pictures are not in chronological order.

Hiroshima Castle.

Pretty garden.  Even in the rain.

Crystal and I try on some period clothing.  that helmet...was HEAVY!

Hiroshima-style Okonomiyaki.  Here are the layers:  Bottom is a thin pancake of sorts, then yakisoba, cabbage, bean sprouts, some bacon, and an egg.  That is the basic, mine also had cheese and mochi in it.

A-bomb dome.  Well...I did not want to smile in front of it, so I am sort of smirking.  

One thing about Hiroshima...I will admit that before we went I was a bit nervous...I am American, though clearly I was not alive during WWII, but I still had some nerves that people would stare or glare or be rude/whatever.  I could not have been more wrong.  Everyone was incredibly friendly, even around the dome and in the peace museum.  They are not promoting hatred or revenge or blame or anything of the sort.  It is all about awareness, here is what happened, here is why it happened and (most importantly) here is why it should NEVER happen again.  I do not think I have ever been to such a well-thought-out museum.  I was very impressed and moved and I think I learned more in an hour in the peace museum than I did in school when we studied WWII.  I strongly recommend if you ever have a chance, please go to Hiroshima.  I think one of the biggest things for me is the fact that the mayor of Hiroshima writes a protest letter EVERY TIME there is some sort of nuclear weapons test in the world.  EVERY TIME.  They have copies of them all on display.  It was really incredible to see all of the letters that have been written.

One more picture...we took 1000 cranes with us and hung them in the peace park.  A lot of people do this, so they have these really nice cases where you can hang them, and I assume every once in a while they go in and empty them out to make room for more.

Alright...end of me telling you how amazing Hiroshima is and let's move on to Miyajima.  It is an island, so we went by boat!  Again, not chronological order here.

You may know Miyajima...have you ever seen a picture of a HUGE red gate surrounded by water.  It is often called the "floating torii."  Well if not...my pictures will be no help, because little did we know, the torii was under construction when we went!!!  It was so sad!!

There you have it...in all it's glory.  This is almost exactly high tide.

We were very very very sad that it was all scaffolded up.

Naturally, when there is scaffolding, the answer is to buy a small wooden statue of the torii and then stand at exactly the right angle...and...bam!  There it is!  The red gate.  This is low tide, and you can actually walk down where the torii is and walk under it gather shells and fill your shoes with sand and do other wonderful things, too!

Other things to do on Miyajima...take two cable cars to the top and make momiji manjuu!  Momiji are the maple trees and manjuu are a kind of sweet, cakey on the outside and usually filled with red bean paste.  though they have custard and chocolate and green tea and other deliciousness!

Maybe I should be a doctor...?

Deer place#2.  there are deer on Miyajima, too, but they don't get fed so they leave people alone.  We found Bambi, though!  He seems to be confused and thinks he is a cat.

Fresh grilled oysters!  Yum!

Thousands of small Buddha statues. 

 Ok, well...that is it.  It was a blast!

 Any questions?