Today we had a bike tour in Hiroshima. I was feeling much better, and I was super jealous of Devin’s adventures yesterday. This one was just a bike tour, so no food tastings. To get to the meeting point, we had to ride on the Hiroshima streetcar network. Another public transit hurdle to navigate!
All of the methods of public transit we’ve tried so far use a tap-in/tap-out system. This allows for variable fares based on distance and reduces the ability for someone to cheat the system. The Hiroshima streetcar is different. We tried to tap our phones on the way in on anything that looked like it might trigger the payment system. The tram operator just waved us on. Oh no, we’ve been here before. The train heads out of the station. Devin and I are reading all of the signs about payment, and there are a lot of them, on the streetcar. The streetcar is a flat fare of ¥240 and is paid when you end your journey. There is a change maker machine at the front of the car so you can make exact change on exit. The fare will also work if you want to transfer to another tram line. At our destination, we were able to tap our Suica phone cards and pay the ¥240 for our ride. Crisis averted.
The bike tour was fine. It focused on the one event that most Westerners associate with Hiroshima. That would have been fine, but a bike tour isn’t a great space for that subject, and our guide lacked the communication skills to deliver information somberly.
We did get to visit Shukkeien Garden, a 400-year-old garden with a lovely koi pond. Devin was enamored with the Koi and found out that fish food was sold at the garden. We were given 20 minutes to walk around or feed the koi. Of course Devin focused on the Koi while I wandered the garden.
After the tour, we were starving, and our guide had given us a few recommendations. I wanted to try okonomiyaki, so I obtained a recommendation for a place that makes it. Okonomiyaki is a Japanese dish with two regional variants. The dish is basically a savory pancake with cabbage, various meats, sauces, and toppings. In Hiroshima, they add noodles to this dish. The restaurant had a mobile ordering method that provided easy selection. I had a spicy chicken okonomiyaki, and Devin had yakisoba. Excellent!
We explored some more of Hiroshima and picked up some sweet treats for the train ride tomorrow. The apple in the pictures is a cheese cake! Devin also made it back to the koi so that she could equitably feed the ones she missed earlier at the castle from yesterday.
For dinner I decided to try another okonomiyaki place. The one I picked was a small establishment with three tables and counter service. The waitress greeted us warmly and then proceeded to use a phone translator app on her phone to formally greet us properly in English. We were the only other foreigners in the restaurant and not only did our waitress help us order but the other patrons also assisted when they could. Especially with sauce recommendations and they were right!
