Our last stop was Hiroshima. We planned to spend a little more than a day here, but ended up with almost two full days as a result of us cutting our time in Miyajima short. Angie felt better by the time we got to Hiroshima and our room wasn’t ready early so we dropped our luggage and headed out to the atomic bomb dome and peace memorial park.
We spent most of the afternoon walking around the park and viewing the exhibits of the National Peace Memorial Hall for the Atomic Bomb Victims and the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum. Both are well done and sobering reminders of the horrific damage caused by nuclear weapons and the massive loss of life and suffering of largely innocent Japanese civilians. I thought the exhibits came across as neutral, factual statements of the events that led up to the bombing as well as the damage and human suffering resulting from the explosion.
The Peace Memorial Museum was quite busy. Although we did not have to wait to enter the exhibits, there was quite a bit of congestion throughout the first section of the museum. I noticed after our visit that tickets can be purchased in advance and that when heavily congested there can be wait of an hour or so to enter the museum. We were glad that we were visiting during the low season.
We finished out the first day in Hiroshima with walking through the main shopping area before returning to the peace park for dinner and taking a street car back to our hotel. Japan is known for its wide assortment of vending machines and an entire post could be probably be devoted to vending machines. We noticed more vending machines in Hiroshima, with one storefront on the main shopping street consisting of nothing but vending machines that sold different ethnic foods.
Our last day in Japan was pretty relaxed since we had already explored the atomic bomb related memorials. We set off to see Hiroshima Castle and do a little more shopping. Hiroshima Castle was built in 1589 as a plain castle in the center of a city as opposed to one built on a bluff or mountain. The castle was the physical and economic center of Hiroshima and survived until it was destroyed by the atomic bomb in 1945. It was rebuilt a couple of times and is now a museum with exhibits describing the history of Hiroshima as well as containing samurai armor and swords. There are nice views of the city from the top floor.
In the afternoon, we looked for a cafe to have tea and found a cat cafe that was well reviewed. We didn’t bother to read the reviews and instead headed out to find Cafe Neko Catton. To our surprise there were no live cats at the Cafe Neko, but everything else was cats and cat-themed. I don’t know what I was expecting, but apart from one of the owners, I was the only male in the cafe. It was a very nice cafe and a visit I won’t soon forget.
We then did a little thrift shopping while waiting for a dinner restaurant to open. We had dinner where I enjoyed one version of Hiroshima’s take on Okonomiyaki – a Japanese teppanyaki savory pancake. After dinner we caught the street car back to our hotel. It was a busy time with people still traveling home from work. One young guy had apparently had a tough Monday after a long weekend because he promptly fell sound asleep after sitting down next to Angie. He eventually woke up as the streetcar emptied upon arriving at Hiroshima train station.
