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Published: April 19th 2024
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Left the Sanco Inn Hotel at 8:30 and had plenty of time to buy coffee/ matcha lattes and buns before boarding our Shinkansen bullet train to Hiroshima which left on time as usual at 9:12. It was a very comfortable 90 minute trip.
Hotel Flex was an easy 10 minute walk from the station. We again took advantage of the luggage forwarding service, but this time sending all three of our big bags and packing everything into backpacks. This time, Krissy used her bigger backpack and I used the backpack that normally attaches to my Osprey suitcase. It worked quite well, I carried the heavier pack on my back and the second one on my front. We were able to leave our bags at the hotel as we were too early to check in.
We then had a pleasant walk to the bus stop, mainly along the Kyobashi River. Hiroshima on first impressions seems a beautiful city, being situated on a river delta area. The plan was to have a good look around Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park. Krissy decided after reading some reviews, that the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum wouldn't be very appropriate for Oscar, so she was happy
to let Daisy and I go in, while she took Oscar for a walk around the park. In fact, she ended up finding a Children's Science Museum, called 5 Days, in the neighbouring Hiroshima Gate Park. The Museum was predictably very sad and I felt quite emotional reading some of the stories. Visiting this museum reminds you why there really should be a complete world wide ban on nuclear weapons.
After leaving the museum we inspected the Hiroshima Victims Memorial Cenotaph, Children's Peace Monument, Bell of Peace and watched a very interesting video at the Hiroshima National Peace Memorial Hall about the Akutsuki Corps. These were cadets as young as 15 who were being trained as suicide soldiers. They were being trained to pilot balsa wood boats, with depth charges loaded, into enemy ships which would detonate the charges. The video featured many of these men who were part of the Akutsuki Corps. They are still alive because when the bomb dropped on Hiroshima, their base was just far enough away that they were not affected and instead of being deployed as suicide pilots, there were deployed to help at Hiroshima.
We then walked into the adjoining Hiroshima
Gate Park and met Krissy and Oscar at the Children's Science Museum. We had a very late lunch at a Hawaiian themed cafe, then made our way to Hiroshima Castle. We were a little too casual when we got the castle grounds, thinking that there wasn't much to see as the part we entered just seemed to be ruins. Consequently, when we finally got the other end of the park, the actual castle came into view but we missed the last entry time (17:30) by just seven minutes. So we've seen two castles now, but haven't been inside. Hiroshima Castle however is a reproduction, but a very good one. Himeji Castle, which we plan to see on Sunday, is still the original structure.
We then decided to walk back to our hotel which took about 25 minutes. As we had a late lunch we just bought a few things to eat from a Family Mart store next door, for dinner.
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