As you can tell from the title, I saved the third day of the journey for Miyajima, which is a quick 30-minute train ride down from Hiroshima itself. Once again, I could tell from the clouds that this would be another drizzly rainy day, but there was no helping it! I was determined to go to Miyajima because I was to go home the next day.

The train was pretty full because it was the weekend, so once I got down to Miyajima-guchi Station, I anticipated a mass exodus to the ferry (and there was), so I shot out of the train and straight to the ferry area. I recommend just buying your round trip tickets at this time – it takes just as much time to get through the line and it might save you time later if you’re in a rush to make the ferry back.  The ride only takes about 10 minutes from the Miyajima-guchi pier, so you’ll be there before you know it! And you’ll have a lot of good views of the World Heritage Site as you’re approaching the area. Choose a good place to sit/stand early on though (probably on the starboard side of the boat), as many photographing travellers will jump to the fore upon approach!

The first bit of time I spent there was simply wandering around the area. I took a short jaunt to the left once exiting the ferry, just to see what was there, and that’s where I came upon the small torii gate pictured above, looking out onto the water. I found a cute little deer over there as well, which led me to wander some of the streets a bit, guiding me to a local little park area with a couple more deer wandering around. Then I decided to head back to my main destinations. It’s a really peaceful place, I think. Being in and around nature is very calming for me, so if you find yourself desirous of a little outdoor adventure, I think Miyajima is a good place.

So I started my walk over to Itsukushima Shrine, wandering the narrow streets and shopping alleys, while stopping in at another shrine on the way. An interesting aspect of Miyajima Island is that there are many little deer running around, very intent on food. They’re very sweet for the most part though. On my walk over to Itsukushima I got distracted by a lovely pagoda to my left, uphill, so I decided to head up there first before going into the temple complex. The shrine I stumbled upon was called Hokokujinjahonden (豊国神社ほんでん). It was a pretty vast temple, bigger in scale than most I had been in before. Just the inner halls and the wooden structures looked larger than I had seen before!

The sakura were blooming beautifully throughout the whole area, even with all the rain, so the island was a beautiful spring vision to behold. I’m a big fan of pagoda structures… I think I’ll dream to have one someday, even if it’s quite small… :)

So I headed down again to the main courtyard preceding Itsukushima. This particular shrine is one of the largest continuous ones I’ve been in. I think they also get a good amount of money in through tourism to keep the place updated and looking fresh; I noticed as I walked through that renovations were being done in some of the smaller areas of the complex. If you get a chance, you can get in a canoe of some sort and ride through The Great Torii. I didn’t get a chance to do it, but I wasn’t too fussed. If I go again, I’ll definitely try to do it though, as it’s a blessing of some sort. It’s a great place to have marked off of my travel list (which I very highly recommend) but my true favorite place will be in the next post: Miyajima ~part 2~! Until then, here’s a preview of the area to come, which was an easy 10-minute walk from the exit of Itsukushima. It’s a foresty walk, featuring some of my favorite deer friends! :)