[JAPAN 2015] Day 6: Okayama & Miyajima

Before making my way to Miyajima today, I decided to take a stroll to Okayama Castle, where I heard the garden was beautiful. 

Okayama Castle

A cover of Shiina Ringo's Gibbs was playing at this boathouse haha

Cute interior of the tram

Lunch in Okayama station before I have to catch the next train to Miyajima

I first found out about Miyajima after having seen a few photographs of the Miyajima floating torii gate floating around (ha, geddit geddit). I was excited to get to see the area, and beyond the fact that it had a floating torii, there wasn't much else that I knew about Miyajima before googling up about it. 

There are a lot of deers on Miyajima, and they are not to be disturbed. BEWARE THE DEERS.

Entrance into Itsukushima Shrine

I decided to make my way to the top of Mt. Misen via the cable ropeway. Upon descending the cable ropeway, you would still have to trek around ~1.3km (a 30-40 minutes trek) to get to the viewpoint on top. 

Went into one of the cable cars with an elderly Japanese couple (Japanese people do like trekking a lot don't they - I saw a few women wearing heels and shoes that were definitely not appropriate for hiking lol, but seriously kudos to them for making it in heels. Girl power!). The couple was hesitant to talk at first but upon hearing me utter a "sumimasen" immediately assumed I could speak Japanese, lol. Gotta love how they're always willing to give people the benefit of the doubt. 

Chatted with them throughout the whole journey and apparently they have a daughter who works in a hotel in Sabah! Small world indeed. This is one of the things that makes me happy to travel - you find a small degree of separation somewhere along the way.

Anyway, we separated and I took to the Mt. Misen trail. As there was less than 2 hours to sunset, the staff at the station reminded us to quickly go up and down the trail if we decided to do so. So if you were planning to hike this, make sure you have ample time to trek back and make your way to the cable car downwards.

The climb up was pretty steep and I had to keep up the mantra of "it'll be worth it it'll be worth it it'llbeworthitwillitbeworthitOMGletitbeworthit" in order to trek the last few meters lol.

I treated myself to a melon pan because I want to waste all the calories I've burnt when I trekked onto Mt. Misen. Yes, I'm irrational that way.

By this time the water has once again decided to appear, and sunset is upon us.

WHY YOU LITTLE--- MY MELON PAN!!!

Saddened by my melon pan thievery, I turned back to the landscape to heal my broken heart.

...and then bought myself an anago bun to heal the wound :P

 

After the day I had, I went back and checked-into one of the hotels on Miyajima Island and fell asleep almost immediately, lol. It had to be said, the new shoes that I wore on the trek to Mt. Misen proved to be too inadequate for the trek - the sole of my shoes actually came off and I had to wear them for the next 24 hours because I couldn't find any shoe stores in Miyajima :'D Well at least I didn't wear heels, that would've killed my feet tbh, girl power or no.

The next day I would have to wake up early again to catch the earliest ferry out of Miyajima and make my way to Osaka!

Go to Day 5 (Okayama & Kurashiki) | Go to Day 7-10 (Nanba, Kobe & USJ)
Japan 2015 Masterpost