Day 8 A guided tour of Hiroshima

Today we had a 4 hour tour, including lunch afterwards, with our tour leader, who is from Hiroshima, along with two other couples, one from South Africa and one from California.

The whole experience was very moving yet also uplifting. The Peace Museum was dimly lit and although the crowds were large everyone was quiet and respectful, taking in the enormity of what was facing them. Obviously I didn't take photos of the immense human suffering, just tried to absorb what I was seeing and reading, along with everyone else.

This was a bank, one of very few buildings which survived

Golden Week  Flower Festival began after the war, everyone has three days off work, there are flower beds planted throughout the city

The Peace Bridge

The Peace Museum

Two trees survived the blast and continue to bloom each year

New trees for the Peace Park were donated from all over Japan 

The Peace Bell

A Memorial to all those killed in the blast

The Children's Peace Monument

The artwork behind this monument is made from thousands of tiny origami cranes, which symbolise longevity, good fortune, peace and hope in Japanese culture. It is believed that if you fold 1000 origami cranes then you will be granted a wish

The iconic building that was left standing, which is now known as the Peace Dome

We went into the Tower

Took some photos 

and tried our hand at making origami cranes

We kept ours, some choose to let them float down into this glass side of the tower

The epicentre was a hospital, the only staff member to survive was the director who was away on business

He paid for it's re-building with his own money

We had a very good lunch with the group afterwards

There are yellow textured tiles on the pavements throughout Japan to aid the visually impaired.

All the office workers are smartly dressed

Late afternoon we walked to The Shukkei-en Garden, some 1600m from the epicentre, it was totally destroyed by the blast and has been rebuilt and replanted.

We called into the supermarket on our way back to the hotel, bought ourselves a veritable feast and sorted out our laundry before sending our suitcases on to Kyoto tomorrow morning, in the hope that they might arrive the following day but it seems that two days might be more likely.