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Meeting up with someone actually worked! Me and a friend made during my stay in Nagasaki managed to meet up in Hiroshima and head to Miyajima Island - where there is the floating red gate. And it was sunny!
Getting there was pretty easy and the ferry was fine, if a little cold. As soon as we got there we were greeting my a deer trying to get into our pockets. I had heard there were deer but I didn't realise they would just be hanging around all over the place.
We headed over to the floating gate where there is the red wood temple. We were very lucky. Not only did we seem to go through during a lul in the crowd but a tradition Japanese wedding was taking place! With traditional instruments, sake drinking, incense, fancy sake pouring things, priests. The bride was made up in a beautiful white kimono with beautiful hair pieces to match. It was a very quiet, solum affair. I didn't see the bride crack a smile until it was all finished! But it did give the feeling that in the UK a wedding is a celebration, where as here it feels like it's taken as something far more sacred. We got some photos while they were posing for their new family portrait (the photographer looked like Afro Samurai.) then queued up to take some selfies (with my selfie stick) with the gate in the background. Didn't take long. When we finished the line had grown quite long already. We took time walking through the rest of that area and looking at the temples before finding somewhere to eat.
Then. Mount Misen.
Yeah. We got the rope lift up. Although you have to walk part way up the mountain to get to that! But boy it was worth it. Going up in the lift gave the most beautiful views. And at the top they had viewing poles that when you looked through you could see that area. For example Hiroshima, when you looked through that pipe, you would be in line with looking at Hiroshima.
We walked up the rest of the mountain to a lovely temple and the eternal fire (used to light the flame of peace in Hiro). You could go inside the temple with the fire but it was so smokey it made my eyes burn!
We headed down the mountain after that, seeing little stone status that had hats or bibs on so they don't get cold was adorable. The views were stunning.
Then we saw the tide had gone out. So we picked up the pace to get back to the red gate. The tide had gone out so far that we could walk right up to the gate while the sun set.
Once it did set, it got cold, and quick. So we got back on the ferry and got back to Hiroshima. I was tired and hungry so we just got a good old Maccy D's. But I have kinda missed having food that requires no effort...
Then my friend worked on my going to get 'just one drink' so eventually I said ok. But one of two things will happen. 1) I will get even more tired and start falling asleep. Or. 2) I wake up.
I woke up.
And we had found a bar with plenty of sake options and at a cheap price. The 'one drink' turned into multiple drinks. See the thing about me and sake is that if its reishu (chilled sake) I can gulp the stuff down. Atsukan (heated sake) I don't like so much, but you're only meant to heat cheap sake to take the taste away. Everything we drank was chilled so it tastes good and went down quick. Recipe for disaster. Luckily I just got drunk instead. Granted, I was very drunk. But at least I wasn't staying at a church like my -now very drunken- friend is...
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