Hiroshima - beautiful city with a sad past

---

An early start to get our first taste of genuine japanese gardens and what are beautiful sight the Shukkei gardens are. We then wandered to the Hiroshima Castle, a 1950s replica of the original with an interesting museum inside. Then we strolled on to the A-Bomb dome, Peace Memorial Park, Flame of Peace and Children's Peace Monument. All very moving but particularly the kids' monument given that there was a school group singing there. Many children still make origami cranes of all sizes and place them at the monument in recognition of a girl who died from leukemia after the bombing. Before she died she tried to make 1000 cranes hoping it would bring her good luck. Alas she died at 10 years of age. We then walked back to the hotel, so a good 6kms or more walked during the day. We took a 4.15 train to Kyoto. The station there is enormous and after some confusion, we found our ryokan (hotel), turning a 6 min walk from the station into an hour of confusion! Our room is half the size of the previous room so it might test us all after four nights in a cosy environment!

---