静岡と四国を行ったり来たり

A Short World Heritage Tour, Inspired by My Wife

Since the tea-picking season has settled down, we decided—at my wife's suggestion—to visit some World Heritage sites.
From Miyoshi City, the nearest World Heritage locations include Himeji Castle, the Hiroshima Peace Memorial (Atomic Bomb Dome), and Itsukushima Shrine.
With just one overnight stay, we could visit two places, so we planned a trip from Tuesday to Wednesday this week to see the Atomic Bomb Dome and Itsukushima Shrine.

We were blessed with beautiful weather on both days.
It was our first time visiting the Atomic Bomb Dome. Including the Peace Memorial Museum, we spent about four hours exploring the site. Despite it being a weekday, it was quite crowded, with what looked like school groups on field trips and many international tourists.

On the second day, we visited Itsukushima Shrine. The famous vermilion torii gate standing in the sea and the main shrine building looked like a picture postcard with the fresh green mountains as a backdrop.
After strolling around for about two hours, we enjoyed a delicious set meal of fried oysters.

More than half of the visitors were foreign tourists, and we heard English, Chinese, and other languages we couldn’t identify being spoken all around us.

Japan reportedly has about 26 World Heritage sites.
According to a ranking of “World Heritage Sites in Japan People Most Want to Revisit,” the top place goes to Itsukushima Shrine.
Second is the Historic Monuments of Ancient Kyoto, third is Himeji Castle, followed by Shirakawa-go, Nikko, the Atomic Bomb Dome, Yakushima, Mount Fuji, and the Historic Monuments of Ancient Nara.

We’ve already been to Kyoto many times while our daughter lived there for six years.
Next, we’re planning to visit Himeji Castle, which ranks third.
If we then visit Shirakawa-go, Nikko, and Yakushima, we’ll have completed the top 10!

As our remaining years are limited, it’s now a race—whether we complete the top 10 World Heritage tour first, or our time runs out.