Mt.Misen in Miyajima Island

Finally the hot summer is starting to end. We went to Miyajima island, one of the most scenic spots in Japan, for a short trip. The island is very popular to visit for tourists both outside and inside Japan, and is it located just one hour away from our tea room.

Itsukushima shrine is a very beautiful shrine built more than 1000years ago . Depending on the tides, the scenery of the shrine and the red gate changes. Sometimes it even looks like the shrine is floating on the sea. The red Torii gate that we can see from the main island also sometimes looks like it's floating on the water, and other times you can walk right up to the base of the gate.

The highest mountain in Miyajima island is Mt. Misen. The altitude of the mountain is 535m and it is a very steep mountain. We gave up climbing from the bottom, and instead, we took the cable car. And after, we climbed for about 30 minutes til the top of the mountain. The view from the top was amazing and the Bento box with conger was delicious! It was so good and we were top hungry that we forgot to take pictures of the Bento box. The huge rocks stacked making a tunnel somehow and the Reika-do Eternal Fire hall, which has the fire that has been burning for the past 1200 years were very intriguing.

After going down the mountain to the town of Miyajima, we enjoyed some window shopping. It was a half-day trip, but it was such a nice visit after years since the last time.

I guess we pushed ourselves too much that our feet were hurting during the practice for the tea ceremony the next day.