Konnichiwa from the Nelis family!: Miyajima

On Saturday, we took our first real day trip into Japan. We decided to go to Miyajima, a small island about 25 minutes away by train. The island is famous for it's floating Torii, oysters, and maple leaf-shaped treats. To get there, we walked off base to the bus stop, took the bus to the train station downtown (only a 5 minute ride), hopped a train to Miyajimaguchi, and from there took a ferry to the island.

It was a gorgeous, albeit hot, day to walk around the village. Bennet loved the train so much, he cried when we got onto the ferry. Of course, once the ferry started moving, he loved it and cried when we got off the ferry!!

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Photo Sharing - Video Sharing - Photo Printing - Photo Books

I'd been warned about the deer in Miyajima before we went but it still surprised me! They are very friendly. In fact, they let us pet them! It was really cool, and Bennet thought they were dogs! He even said "woos woos" to them (his version of barking!).

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Photo Sharing - Video Sharing - Photo Printing - Photo Books

From there we headed to the covered shopping area. There were so many shops with some really interesting things to buy. The street vendors had squid on a stick (which I'd like to try, but I figure I should pace myself...we do have three years after all), fried oysters (which I really do want to try, but it was August 31st, and I was taught to eat oysters only in months ending in -er), and momiji-manju. Momiji-manju are the maple leaf-shaped treats I mentioned. They are like a sweet pancake filled with bean paste or cream cheese. We had the ones with cream cheese since none of us are fans of bean paste. On a side note, bean paste is a very popular filling for Japanese desserts. We also met an english class full of kiddos. They were really cute and asked us some questions.

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Photo Sharing - Video Sharing - Photo Printing - Photo Books

Bennet, of course, made friends along the way. One sweet little old lady held his hand and commented on his long eyelashes. Then he met a little girl out with her mom and grandma. He's quite a hit in Japan already!

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After having some lunch, we walked to the aquarium. The aquarium there is being closed for renovations in December for 3 years, so it was a priority to go there. They had some great animals, but the facilities were so-so. We saw porpoises, sea lions, sharks, and penguins. In fact, the penguins come out to meet the people a few times a day. Bennet got so excited he ran through the crowd, shoving people out of his way, and straight up to the penguin. Of course, that meant that I had to run through the crowd, shoving people out of the way, to get him back. It was embarrassing. But I got to practice my Japanese. Gomensai means I'm sorry.

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Photo Sharing - Video Sharing - Photo Printing - Photo Books

We didn't go through the temple or up the mountain to see the monkeys. It was really hot and we figured since the island is so close, we will be back often. We're planning to come back for Tim's birthday to hike the mountain. So we'll have more pics then. For now, here's some from the weekend.