Enjoying Golden Week

In Japan, around the end of April and the start of May is Golden Week. This is a time when four public holidays coincide, which has led to a custom of making this a special week, with lots of people going on trips. This week, I was lucky enough to be invited by two friends to join them on a four-day Golden Week trip to the Hiroshima region. Here are some of the highlights (all the photos are at the bottom).

On Monday, we started by travelling by Shinkansen from Tokyo to Hiroshima. The train covered the 500 miles (800 km) in about four hours. Before boarding the train, I bought an ekiben from one of the vendors at the station. An ekiben is a meal to eat on the train (eki is station, and ben is short for bento). My ekiben was smoked mackeral on a bed of rice. On arriving in a rainy Hiroshima station, we had a quick but tasty lunch at a ramen place.

The first place we visited on our trip was the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park and Museum, which focuses on the world’s first atomic bomb used against people. The atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima on August 6 1945, and a second bomb was dropped on the city of Nagasaki on August 9. The visit was as harrowing as you would expect it to be. The museum highlighted both the immediate horror of the bomb and the radioactive consequences. Whilst there was some material that talked about the big picture (for example, by the end of December 1945, it is estimated that about 140,000 people had died, out of a total population of about 350,000), the focus was on individuals. The museum has collected a large number of very detailed stories about the people affected by the bomb, including photos, letters, diaries, clothing and children’s toys. We should be glad that no further atomic weapons have been used against people since the two that were dropped on the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945. However, the horrors of war and its impact on civilians still exist around the world today. Seeing this in-depth reporting of what happened to men, women and children in 1945 brings home the terrible things that are happening right now in places right around the world.

From Hiroshima, we took a ferry to get us to our first night’s accommodation, a traditional-style house on the small island of Miyajima. After a short evening run (as part of my run streak) we went for a dinner comprising local oysters and a wonderful traditional meal with strips of conger eel on rice. After dinner we took a stroll around the town and beach. One of the surprising things about Miyajima was the number of deer roaming around the town.

After a wonderful, early breakfast on Tuesday morning, we headed down to Itsukushima Jinja and the Great Torii Gate. The shrine and gate is one of the three must-see locations in Japan (the Nihon Sankei are Miyajima, Matsushima Bay, and Amanohashidate). After the shrine, we took a cable car up Mount Misen and then walked up to Reikado (the Hall of Spiritual Flame). Kobo Daishi was said to have lit it over 1200 years ago, and it has burned ever since. The flame was used as the source of the flame in the Hiroshima Memorial.

Our next destination was Tadanoumi, which required a ferry, followed by trains. Here, we checked into another traditional-style house and dropped our bags, ready for a visit to Takehara. Takehara has a very traditional area that is often used for films. We visited the traditional area and one of the Saihoji Temple. We then had a wonderful okonomiyaki meal in the traditional style (in the traditional area). Before calling it a day, I squeezed in a short (just over 3km) run to keep my streak going. This run made this streak five years and four months long.

Wednesday morning started with another short run (I prefer to do them in the mornings when possible), followed by a self-made breakfast. Our breakfast comprised pizza, local radishes (eaten raw, dipped in salt, eating the stalks as well as the bulbs), with oranges and bananas. From Tadanoumi, we took trains to Onomichi, where we hired bicycles. We left most of our luggage at the cycle hire shop and rode 47km along the Setouchi Shimanami Kaido, a route that links a series of islands in the inland sea. For a snack, we stopped at a roadside place and had tacoten, made from octopus (the taco bit) and fried (the ten bit). The weather was a bit grim, and we arrived at Omishima wet and dirty but in good spirits. After checking in to the very Japanese accommodation we were driven to the local sento (Japanese public bath). The hotel did not have showers or baths, but it did have a service to drive us to the sento. At the sento, we separated into the the men’s and women’s sections. In the sento, like in onsens, you wash yourself to get very clean, and then you enjoy the bath. The sento had a variety of baths (different temperatures, some with massaging jets, some with a view of the sea and islands.

After the sento, we had the most amazing dinner, focusing on fish. One of the more unusual (for me) items was a battered fish head marinated in citrus. In total, my meal included three fish heads: two attached to fish bodies and one (the battered one) on its own,with two more heads on the prawns.

Our last day, Thursday, started with an amazing breakfast, again with a fish theme (my miso soup had a fish head in it). Before cycling back to Onomichi, we visited the nearby shrine. On the journey back, one of our bikes developed a puncture, which cost us some time, but illustrated the right way to support cyclists. The cycle hire company had supplied us with a list of cycle support places along the route. A quick phone call and they sent a van to pick up the bike, take it back to their workshop, fix it, and then returned it to us. This cost us 30 to 40 minutes, but it was a really useful service. The weather on Thursday was completely different to the other days – which meant we took quite a few photographs of the same thing, to highlight the comparison between the journey out and back.

We returned the bikes in Onomichi and took a local train to Fukayama to catch the Shinkansen back to Tokyo. At Fukayama station, we bought food for the four-hour Shinkansen ride (more ekiben). I chose conger eel on a bed of rice to remind me of dinner in Miyajima.

It was an exhausting four days but a very rewarding one. I am indebted to my two friends for sharing their time and country with me.