Miyajima and its famous torii - Japan at Cherry Blossom 2023 - 14
29.03.2023 - Miyajima and its famous torii
Weather: sunny
Walking distance: 15.5 km
On today's agenda is a visit to Miyajima [↗] with the famous torii [↗] standing in the water. We meet shortly after 8am and walk to the nearby station. Half an hour train ride and 10 minutes on a ferry and we are there.
This is one of the main tourist attractions here and of course, it's anything but empty, but at this time of the day, it’s still acceptable.
In fact, our timing is perfect (just by chance, but I take what I get). Low tide was an hour ago and in the meantime, the water is high enough that no one walks to the torii (or even boats go there, as I will see in the afternoon). On the other hand, I can go down to the beach and get a nice angle to shoot the torii from there. I can't shoot 100% straight on, but the version with a 45° angle looks better anyway, as the background is much more favorable. So I don't have to go to the temple and queue up twice (first to pay for the entrance and then on the jetty to get the picture).
By the way: You can get nice pictures of the torii from the ferry too. When you go on the ferry, walk to the end, go to the first or second floor, and stand either straight ahead or on the right side.
From the Torii, we walk through the Momijdani Park to the ropeway up Misen Mountain [↗]. In the park, there is a nice red bridge, which I have on my list, even if it looks much nicer in autumn with the leaves of the trees in red too. First I go down to the riverbed on the "wrong" side and have to do the same again on the opposite side.
Now I'm of course the last one of the group and have to hurry. But where are they? I follow the signs to the ropeway but no one is to be seen. Are they that fast? We bought the tickets on the way and so I join the queue to get in on the second floor. Just as I'm about to enter the cabin, I see them arrive. I have no idea how I managed to pass them.
You are going to take two different types of cabins; first a smaller one for just 6 people and then at a transfer station a bigger one for 30 people for the rest of the climb.
There is the option to walk up but it's some 530 meters and more or less all the way uneven stairs - but we will come to that later. Already the way up to the ropeway station is a sweating matter and so I think it's a good decision to take the ropeway up to the hill and then walk down. The mountain was not on my agenda, but aside from some parks and temples (and of course the torii) there is not a lot you can do and our guide strongly recommends it, as the view over the sea and the island is supposed to be great.
After I have reached the mountain station, I make my way directly to the top of the mountain. Unfortunately, it first goes down quite a bit to reach the path that leads up from below and then the climb begins. Quite exhausting, because most of the "stairs" are simply rocks of different heights that you have to climb up. First I reach a temple that hosts the original eternal fire. From here it was taken to the Peace Park in Hiroshima where you now can find a descendant of it.
At the very top, they've built a two-story observation deck. It may not be the most romantic place with all the people coming and going. But with the benches, they have a great place to eat my lunch. We were told that you can't buy much to eat on the island, so we all went to the 7/11 at the train station and I brought sushi.
This doesn't look like the ones we know (they have those too). It's more of an outdoor version. It has the shape of a triangle with each side being ca. 5cm long and 1cm thick. On the outside is a layer of seaweed, then a thick layer of rice and the filling, in my case red salmon and salt. It tastes quite good although I miss the soya sauce and the wasabi.
If you're interested, I’d recommend buying it early as around noon the popular varieties are already sold out and you have to take what is left.
Our guide recommended going down the Omoto Park trail, which would be a nice walk through the forest even though with limited views. But even though this is the longer way it is mostly stairs. As mentioned: Not the stairs you expect, but rocks with different heights, most of them quite high. Those are not really a friend to the knees. If you have hiking poles it might be a good idea to take them along. Let's see what my knees will tell me tomorrow. But no matter what: Somehow I have to get down from 530 meters to sea level.
Was it worth going up? If the weather is really clear it might be worthwhile as the views from the top are really great. Today it was quite hazy and I have my doubts that I will be able to recover a lot in post, especially as I shot most of the pictures around noon. I would definitely recommend taking the cable car up and down. You still have to climb anyway to enjoy the view from the top or to get to some temples. There's no real advantage to going up or down on foot, other than saving some money. So, I book the trip under "exercise" 😉.
From Omoto Park, at the foot of the mountain, I decide to go to the highly recommended Daishoin Temple [↗], even if it means climbing some stairs again. This temple is a nice one and if I had saved myself the walk, I might have stayed here much longer. But I'm done and want to return to the hotel.
I walk back to the ferry station and just make it on board before the ferry leaves. The same goes for the train to Hiroshima - when I arrive at the station, I can already see the long queue on the other track. I get in line, and 5 minutes later the train pulls in. The disadvantage of this "just-in-time" approach is that I now have to stand for half an hour.
Our guide arranged a table at an Okonomiyaki [↗] restaurant for 6pm. This is a dish that is prepared differently in different regions of Japan, but here in Hiroshima, it's the most popular dish available. You are sitting in front of a metal plate and the dish is prepared right in from of you. There are a lot of videos on YouTube showing how it is done. This one is just an example [↗].
We're on the 6th floor of a multi-purpose building with different types of business and even a capsular hotel. The whole floor is filled with little stands big enough to host a dozen customers. But there are even bigger places like this. One of them is 6 stories high and all floors are filled with Okonomiyaki restaurants.
The portions are quite large, affordable and the taste is absolutely my style.
