Miyajima: Tuesday, November 30 - Thursday, December 2

[escapewindow]

(aka, a shit ton of pictures about the same thing ;-)

(Back in SF; this is the first of my final 2 blog posts about this trip.)

[itsukushima at low tide]

On Tuesday, we checked out, walked to Hiroshima Castle, then walked to the train station. A quick train trip and ferry ride later, we were in Itsukushima, commonly known as Miyajima (shrine island).

I've seen so many breathtaking pictures of Miyajima that I knew this island would be a treasure trove for photography, and I was right. A dead giveaway: the number of people on the ferry with us, with significantly larger and pricier camera rigs than mine. (The same was true at the Eikando light up.)

All waiting for that first view of Itsukushima Shrine.

The view from the ferry (low tide).

This torii was first built in 1168, and has been rebuilt 7 times. The most recent was in 1875. They built it from a single tree, and spent twenty years searching for the perfect tree.

We arrived before our room was ready, so we left our luggage at the hotel and walked to the shrine.

We paid to enter the shrine itself, and planned to come back later during high tide (around sunset) but that never happened.

You could tell how the water would rise to hide the pilings at high tide.


There was a lot of seaweed left behind at low tide.
We later saw a cleanup crew gathering it and hauling it away, like leaves.


There was a wedding happening in the shrine's main building, with a view of the torii.
Tourists lingered and took photos; I didn't feel right doing that, so I moved on and took pictures elsewhere.


The tide slowly coming in.

[shika]

There were a lot of shika (deer) there, wandering about the streets. Cute. My mother said she preferred them over the monkeys :)

The street shika were fairly aggressive in trying to get food from you if they saw or smelled any -- nothing harmful, just a lot of crowding and reaching. The males on the streets had their antlers removed (cut, close to the head), to make them less prone to fighting.

I have way too many pictures of these guys. I only uploaded a handful, the best ones.

The shika up the mountain were more prone to ignoring people while they ate what little grass remained.


Little shika figurines.

We bought some street food -- hot baked sweet potatos. And ate them as we walked. Then we found a bench, and sat down to finish eating.

Hee, hee

Who saw that coming?

The shika first went for the sweet potato in my mother's hand, then for the kuri in her purse. I missed getting a shot of the shika with her front hooves on the bench, but managed to get this one. I think it's my favorite shot of the entire trip.

[itsukushima at night]

High tide and sunset were within a half an hour of each other that day. It was too overcast to see the sun, but I was determined to get some shots of Itsukushima Shrine at high tide as it got dark.

This boat went behind the torii, through it, then lingered for a long time in front of it. Then it went back under, hung around for a bit behind it, then came back under and hung out in front again (when I took this). Then it went back under, hung around the right of the frame for a long while, and went back to port.

Shortly after I stopped filming, I dubbed it "the picture-ruining boat" and joked that we could go take a ride on the picture ruining boat!!! I am kind of curious as to how their pictures turned out.

I have a number of still shots of the boat, but I decided they're not worth uploading.

I also took some long exposure photos of the torii after it grew fully dark, but long exposures throw off the color. I think I like the above shots the best.

(so maybe the boat didn't ruin anything, after all.)

[setonaikai]

Wednesday was a sunny day, as opposed to Tuesday's overcast skies + light rain.

In the morning, we walked the short distance (a mile or two?) to the gondolas to see the view from the top of the island. I was happy to see signs warning people about wild monkies and deer: put your food in lockers! they will steal your bags! ... but we didn't see any monkies at all.

We saw Setonaikai, the inland sea, which is full of small islands. It was bright, yet hazy, making for poor photos. Though there's something picturesque about the islands in the fog.

We were on the second-tallest peak on Miyajima; we then hiked to the tallest peak, a pretty tiring trek. I think I would have handled it easily a week previously; at this point, after wandering all over Kyoto and Matsue and Hiroshima, my legs were definitely getting a mite wobbly.

Afterwards, we walked down the mountain back to the hotel. It wasn't far, distance-wise; a couple miles back down, I think? But it wasn't flat; it was nearly all stone steps, which are harder on your legs. By the time we got back, we were all dead tired.

[&c.]

Miyajima is said to be the birthplace of the shamoji.

We had another traditional Japanese room in Miyajima, same as Matsue. This was a 10 tatami room, as opposed to 8, so it felt roomier. The special Japanese dinners were catered to our room, and were tasty: local oysters and crab were the highlights.

There was a pretty great shopping street between the hotel and the shrine. Tourist-oriented, but fun, and with some great food. And a Sanryo store; we stopped there for some gifts for my nieces, but we couldn't decide on anything.

The hotel had a taiko drum performance downstairs every night at 8:30; the performers were all employees of the hotel (store, front desk, laundry, and ?) It was pretty cool.

For the final song, they turned off the lights and wore green glowing masks and played with purple glowing sticks.

My mother has loved taiko drums since she was a little girl. When they asked for volunteers the first night, she wanted to, but they picked three other women to try to play. The second night, she jumped up and raised her hand, and got to play :)

High tide on Wednesday coincided with both sunrise and sunset. We woke early but went back to sleep; I saw the sun slowiy setting but I stayed in and kept reading news about Wikileaks. I think we were all exhausted by all the things we had already seen and done this trip. Luckily, I'm really pleased with how my photos turned out from Tuesday.

On Thursday, we ate breakfast, then took the ferry back to the mainland.

Full set here.