Japan - Day 6

This morning we were up bright and early to go and enjoy our free hotel breakfast. Full of mini-crossiants (me) and sushi (Shanon), we spent some time hanging about in our room before walking to the train station to wait for our train for another hour. Waiting is a part of the travel experience which I will never enjoy! But finally our train arrived and an hour later dropped us off in Hiroshima.

The change in the weather between today and yesterday was rather significant, with today being cold and drizzly. But we weren't going to let that get us down, and after checking into the Hotel Granvia and donning our raincoats, we headed out straight back out again. We caught a streetcar to the Atomic Bomb Dome at the Memorial Peace Park, and after a quick wander around we escaped the drizzle and went into the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum. I came here in 1992 and remember leaving the museum quite shaken at what I'd seen. It's only 50 yen to get in and the museum was just as gripping and chilling as what I'd remembered. It was extremely busy, which did make it difficult to take time and read all the information there was displayed. My thighs were in a bit of pain from the stair-climbing at Himeji, and after an hour or so in the museum my feet were killing me, so we viewed the second half of the museum at quite a brisk pace anyway.

It was about 4pm by the time we left the museum, and since I could barely stand by this time I was eager to get on a streetcar back to the hotel before rush hour. But then, when we were literally metres from streetcar stop, Shanon spotted on a map that Hiroshima Castle was close by. So he dragged me there instead. I was miserable on the walk over, but once we got to the castle my frown quickly turned upside down. We didn't go inside, but spent some time wandering the grounds and admiring it from the outside. We were mostly all alone, the rain had pretty much stopped, and it was extremely peaceful there. I even gained a second wind and managed to walk all the way back to the hotel.
Once again our hotel room had big windows, and this time our hotel was actually located at the station so we had plenty to sit and watch as we relaxed before dinner. Dinner was Lotteria once again - we couldn't resist the lure of those yummy chocolate balls!