Himeji, Kurashiki & Miyajima

We had a few “light” touringtdays throughout the trip, including stopovers and daytrips. In the interest of time, we’re combining three of these days into one post.

Kurashiki

This small town, which is filled with historic buildings, is well off the beaten path.  It made a great stopping point the day after Kinosaki, especially since Mary was knocked out with a 12-hour bug. The girls and Mark went spent the afternoon popping in and out of shops around the Bikan quarter, which featured lots of folk crafts. We stayed at Ivy Square Hotel, a destination for local weddings.

Himeji

We broke up our trip to Hiroshima by stopping at Himeji for a night. It’s a small town with what’s considered the finest castle in Japan. With fortifications built in 1333, Himeji-jo is one of

only a few original castles in the country (built in 1580). The main castle is under construction right now, but we took a tour of the grounds and heard stories about how samurai defended the castle. Maura and Kara got into the samurai spirit, too.

Miyajima

On our second day in Hiroshima, we took a train and ferry to Miyajima, a nearby island, to check out the floating torii gate of Itsukushima-jinja (shrine). You’ve probably seen pictures of the shrine and torii gate, both look like they’re floating on water at high tide.  (Here’s a photo at low tide.) The story is that commoners were not allowed access to the island, and the only way

they could was by boat after passing through the torii gate. We walked into the bay, saw a different ecosystem at work (crabs and other shellfish jockeying for position and nutrition), and placed coins on the torii gate for luck.