Hiroshima was a short ferry and train ride from Miyajima.

The first stop in Hiroshima was the peace park and associated memorials and museums. The museum was quite good. There were a bunch of artifacts and stories from the bombing. It was extremely horrific. Although the museum was overrun with schoolchildren running around like maniacs and filling out worksheets, which didn’t add to the atmosphere much.

For lunch, we went to an okonomiyaki place!

Holy crap okonomiyaki is amazing. I’d never heard of it before this trip, but it’s by far my favorite Japanese food. Way better than sushi. It translates to “whatever you like”, and that’s basically what it is. You grill it on a hot table and put a bunch of random stuff. Bean sprouts, seafood or meat, other vegetables, eggs, I don’t even know what else. Then it’s topped with this special okonomiyaki sauce and some mayonaise. Hiroshima-style okonomiyaki also has noodles, although that’s mostly unique to Hiroshima.

They cooked it right in front of us:

Damn it was good… My mouth is drooling now just thinking about it…

After this meal, we went to many more okonomiyaki places throughout our trip.

In the afternoon, we visited the Hiroshima castle.

It was a nice view from the top and had some large grounds, but overall it wasn’t that exciting. Apparently during WWII it was a military base. and we saw where the underground room was that someone sent out the first message that Hiroshima had been destroyed.

For dinner, we went to another of those drinking places where you have a bunch of different choices. Wasn’t that great. Don’t go to those places if you can find anywhere better.

The next morning, we headed to Kyoto!