Hiroshima and Miyojima

So we had our second round trip on the bullet train, this time as part of a tour going down to Hiroshima and Miyojima.  Miyojima first- this is a small island just across from Hiroshima which we had to get a ferry for across a little stretch of water where they catch oysters-

oyster beds

naturally the island has a shinto gate on it- a proper massive one though just sat on the sea bed- not buried or anything- its just held there by its own weight.

tash next to the massimo shinto gate in miyojima

If you look closely above, tash is standing to the left of it!  We also had a look around one of the big temples there.

Then we headed over to Hiroshima to see where the atomic bomb was set off during world war 2.  Was actually really interesting if a bit grim- they showed you a lot of the after effects in lots of detail. There is one of the original buildings still standing which was hit by the original buildings still standing which was hit by the bomb, but wasn’t totall destroyed.

The "A Bomb Dome"

They also had a big meseum there with pieces that were retreived from after the blast- like roof tiles and pieces of stone wall which bubbled up and started to melt!  It’s mad to think that things like stone melted!  Anyway this has to be a brief post because we only have 30mins on the hotel computer here in Kyoto, and the images my new camera takes are enoumous and take about 3 mins each to upload!  We leave Kyoto tonight back on the bullet train to Yokohama, then tommorow night we’re going to try and get a night in the Capsule Hotels!  Will let you all know how we get on!