A Day on Miyajima, Beyond the Crowds

O-torii Gate, Miyajima, Japan, Nov 2025

Today I did a day trip from Hiroshima to Miyajima. I’d initially had mixed feelings about it because of how touristy people had said it was. My eyes bulged as I exited the train, a herd of us streaming toward the ferry like a concert crowd spilling out after the final song. I braced myself for a miserable wait, but the queue moved almost magically. People vanished onto the giant vessels as if we were stepping into Hermione Granger’s beaded bag.

By 10:30am the island was already buzzing. I wandered the market streets and reached the famous O-torii Gate, an orange torii standing out in the tidal flats, its six pillars rising straight from the sand and water.

It reminded me of the Wanaka tree, with everyone gaping at this floating mysterious beautiful shape in the water, lining themselves along the shore for photos, and tripods set up in the wet, mud-coloured sand. Yet, I was surprised by how my perspective had shifted; rather than be irked by the busyness, I could remain in my own bubble and watch the world around me like a movie scene, the tourists a natural part of the scene.

Itsukushima Jinja, the shrine, felt orderly and neatly designed. I imagined how incredible it must look at high tide, the wooden floors hovering above soft waves. The shrine opened onto a Noh stage, the wooden platform where court dances and performances were traditionally held. 

At one point I accidentally stepped onto a sacred altar while trying to follow the signs to the altar, not realising I was already on it. Two young girls waiting in line for shrine stamps stared at me. I was painfully, unmistakably that tourist.

Seeing the Gate from different angles was also fascinating. From the shrine, the gate looked much closer than the two-hundred-meter distance stated, and much smaller than it truly was. Leaving the building and walking past low pine trees, the light hit the Gate different from this angle, shade giving way to full sun. Suddenly the Gate was blazing orange against the glittering blue water.  I stopped beneath a pine tree beside an old man perched quietly on a bench; we watched it together. The alignment of the columns, the curve of the roof like the hull of a boat, the mountain horizon behind it — something about the geometry hit me and I couldn’t look away. Down on the sand, people were reduced to tiny moving specks. The tide had fully receded now, and crowds wandered right up to the ten-metre-wide pillars. Part of me wanted to do the same, but a bigger part didn’t want to break the spell.

Omoto Park felt like the Nara I’d imagined: deer wandering under twisted, sunlit branches, tiny bridges over shallow water, sudden pockets of silence. A place that shrunk the world down to trees and breathing. The male deer got to keep their antlers too.

Omoto Park, Miyajima, Japan, Nov 2025

I started the hike to Komagabayashi peak. The forest darkened quickly, branches tangled overhead, roots twisting underfoot. Water flowed somewhere out of sight. At first I kept my headphones in because I had a sudden urge to listen to A$AP Rocky — a ridiculous soundtrack for such a peaceful place — but I forced myself to pull them out. I wanted to hear the forest.

With the trees forming a ceiling, the light disappeared. Eventually, the birdsong faded and it was just me, my footsteps, my breath, the feel of the dirt rising and falling under my shoes. The path was relentlessly uphill, endless stairs, and only a few people passed me on their way down. When the sky finally appeared through the trees and sunlight scattered across the ground, something in me lit up. I stepped into the warmth. Everything brightened. The world felt alive again. The path, mercifully, flattened.

At Komagabayashi peak, I couldn’t believe the view. From the peak, the whole world opened up with layers of dark green mountains rolling into the sea, the water turning silver under the haze, and small islands sitting quietly in the distance like ink drops on rice paper. Below me, Hiroshima spread out along the coastline, pale and faraway, almost unreal. This was the type of view I might see back at home in New Zealand — Japan seemed to have it all. A few older Japanese ladies sat on a rock eating snacks and laughing, completely at ease, like they’d done this walk a hundred times.

Komagabayashi peak, Miyajima, Japan, Dec 2025

I stayed there for a while, letting the view settle. After a morning of queues and cameras and people everywhere, it felt almost absurd that this much stillness existed on the same island. There was beauty in that contrast — in how the noise could drop away without warning and make you feel like you’d discovered a version of the island you hadn’t expected to see.