Gah, i am so friggin tired today!
Tokyo-tired, not to be confused with tired of Tokyo, which i never am, ever.
We just came back from farewell dinner for our current roommate, Jacob, who’s leaving us tomorrow morning, and as always we had tons of good food and great company.
I really am way too sleepy to be blogging, but i am so behind with the pictures, so here goes!
We hopped on the Sakura Shinkansen, a fancy new one, at Fukuyama (this is last Sunday, by the way, if you haven’t been paying attention!) and it took only 25 minutes to Hiroshima. The seats in standard reserved where like friggin first class, so i was almost a little sad we weren’t staying on it longer!
From Hiroshima we took a train, and from Miyajimaguchi we got on the ferry to the island.
The weather was great already and we were excited to see the famous Otorii from the boat, but as we approached our hearts sank a bit. The torii was covered in scaffolding. Like, covered. Not quite as picturesque as we were hoping it’d be!
But our disappointment quickly vanished when we went ashore and saw all the deer. I love wild deer!
So yeah, all was forgiven.
I had directions to our Ryokan, and it was located just right, and was super easy to find. I love Ryokans, but we don’t often get a chance to stay at one, so that part in itself was pretty exciting.
Check in wasn’t till three in the afternoon, but we put our bags in the reception, quickly changed into something more touristy, and then ran out, maps in hand, to see the sights.
I’ll get to the torii and Itsukushima Shrine in another post, so i’ll skip those and go straight to the mountain part.
Mount Misen was on the agenda. I love mountains, probably cause i’m from such a flat land, but i never think of the how-to-get-up-there part… in general, i don’t think things through a lot of the time, but that’s another story! Anyway, the how-to-get-up-there was by the Miyajima Ropeway. Their slogan? “Let’s go for an Air Walk!”
Oh, yeah, guess who’s terrified of heights?
Yeah, that would be me.
Going up to the ropeway station, i was nervous, but also just stoked to be seeing rocks and moss and waterfalls and prettiness, so i guess part of me just assumed i’d deal?
Or that it’d be a bit like the ropeways on Takao-san in Tokyo, which were scary, to me, but harmless in hindsight.
This was nothing like Takao.
First of all, there were two of them.
The first ride was 10 minutes long. The longest 10 minutes ever, possibly. The gondola was tiny, and lucky for me, it was just me and Allan in it.
I full on freaked out. There’s no better way to describe it. This wasn’t an anxiety attack, because, well, for one thing, i was in complete and rational fear for my life! But still, i was hyperventilating, laughing hysterically and shaking so much i could barely hold my camera, which i needed to distract myself from what i assumed was my certain and rapidly approaching death!
The second ride was only 5 minutes in a much larger gondola with lot’s of people. Still terrified and shaking, i handled this one a lot better. Even Allan was scared, but of course he couldn’t show it, or i’d freak out even more, but yeah… we were up high. Very fucking high.
The view was great, of course, even if we didn’t go all the way to the summit.
Instead we started heading down, so the darkness wouldn’t catch up with us halfway, cause you know i wasn’t about to set foot near the ropeway ever again.
The walk down was hard on the calves, but so fun and magical.
Sadly we didn’t see any monkeys, but we saw lizards, a fun centipede, deer, and the most Miyazaki-ish landscape i’ve seen in a long time!
So much fun!
Oh, and i felt like kind of a badass for doing something that really friggin scares me. Good for me.
Ok, pictures!
I had Allan help me cut these posts down to the best and most essential pictures, cause they were all way too long, and i couldn’t do it myself. So yeah, only the best (hopefully) for you, dear readers!
Before going up the mountain (i wish i’d had a better film in the camera for these, but whatever)
Plenty of cool stuff to see already, and the weather was just amazing
Small torii
Moss, always moss
And then, this… i’ll post some even more horrifying ones from my iPhone later
Spectacular view, still shaking
Going down, so happy to be going down (and moss again)
A sunny moment
Plastic looking centipede-ish buddy, that was even brighter and more plastic-y looking in real life
Hello deer friend!
Closed, cute restaurant
Pretty lamp, pretty everything
Our day of sightseeing did not end here, so there will be a few more posts from our trip before we can get back to Tokyo and the present.
The present, in which i am eating snacks and blogging, while Allan and Jacob try to wrap a giant painting in Japanese gift-wrapping paper from 100 yen shop.
Oh, and i’m looking at my new tattoo… maybe i’ll post about that later too?
Right? Fun bug on mountain win! Thanks for checking and commenting, it makes me wanna post more.
Yes, i definitely wanna go back there!
Right? i was pretty amazed (and scared) by it all!
Wow, thanks so much, that's really sweet of you to say!
Dude, so terrifying! But yay for deer friends!
Yes, awesome! The label "Amalie's guide to Tokyo" is actually for all over Japan, and i've been using it to tag fun places since the blog started, so there should be some interesting suggestions there. Maybe even a few not covered by lonely planet! But Mount Misen is definitely a place i'd recommend going!
I was like "how could a centipede be fun?" but hey, you were right. GREEN!! I am so loving your photos Amalie!! I'm glad you are posting so often.
Miyajima looks so much fun (even with the terrifying ropeway), shame about the Tori but that gives you an excuse to go again. These pictures are fantastic!
So beautiful!
Totally amazing photography! Truly beautiful, you make me wish I could buy prints!
You are brave! You know I share your fear for heights…. I can totally relate to it!
Aww I want to eat in the cute restaurants and have deers as friends!
Wow! Beautiful as usual :))) I am set in stone, I am heading to Japan this time next year when my Indian visa expires… ordering my lonely planet guide today! Though I am already taking notes on places I'd like to visit like Mount Misen!!