Hiroshima

Hiroshima is built on a delta, split into fingers of land by channels running down to the bay. The openness of that ground is part of the history: there was very little between the blast and the city, and the reconstruction that followed had a flat, unobstructed plan to work with. The result is a centre that is unusually easy to walk and unusually green along the water, with promenades on the embankments and bridges every few hundred metres.

Walking the riversides is the cheapest thing to do here and one of the most worthwhile, because it puts the memorial landscape in the context of an ordinary working city rather than isolating it. The park occupies what had been the commercial heart, and the streets immediately around it are shops and offices and trams. Seeing that continuity is a large part of what distinguishes visiting from reading.

Two days covers the two things everyone comes for and covers them properly. The Peace Memorial Park and museum is a morning that should not be rushed and should not be followed immediately by something cheerful; Miyajima, with the torii standing in the water at high tide, is a ferry and a tram ride away and takes an afternoon and ideally an evening.

Staying the night on Miyajima is the single best piece of advice in this prefecture. The day trippers leave on the last ferries, the deer and the lit torii are left to the people staying, and the island becomes a completely different place.

Three days lets you add the Setouchi islands and the cycling route across them, or Onomichi at the eastern end of the prefecture, which is a hillside town of temples and cats and the start of the bridge route to Shikoku.

The Peace Memorial Museum is thorough and unsparing, and most people come out of it needing air and quiet rather than a lunch reservation and a schedule. The common mistake is to book the day densely on either side of it, which leaves you walking into something lively while still carrying the exhibition.

Build the day the other way round. Go in the morning, when the rooms are least crowded. Give the park itself an hour afterwards on foot — it is designed to be walked through rather than looked at. Then choose something outdoors and undemanding for the afternoon: the garden on the northern side of the centre, the castle grounds, or simply the riverbank. Save the island and its evening tide for the following day, where it belongs, rather than compressing both into one and doing neither properly.

The Sanyo Shinkansen reaches Hiroshima in about four hours from Tokyo and an hour and a half from Shin-Osaka; Hiroshima Airport is inland with a bus link of around 50 minutes. In the city, the tram network is the practical way to move and runs to the Peace Park and the ferry pier at Miyajimaguchi, which is also a JR stop. Ferries to Miyajima take ten minutes, and a fast boat runs directly from the Peace Park in season. Onomichi is about 90 minutes east by shinkansen and local train. The Shimanami Kaido has bicycle rental at both ends with one-way drop-off, and buses if you would rather not ride.

Miyajima at low tide, if the floating torii is the image you have in mind — the gate stands on a mud flat for part of every day and the tide tables are published. This is a timing question rather than a season, and it is the single most common disappointment here.

August 6th is the anniversary of the bombing and the city is given over to the commemoration; it is a profound day to be present for and not a day for casual sightseeing. Otherwise Hiroshima is mild and workable year-round, with the usual Inland Sea advantage of a dry, bright winter.

Hiroshima okonomiyaki is layered rather than mixed — batter, a heap of cabbage, pork, then noodles pressed underneath and an egg — and Okonomimura in the city stacks dozens of griddle counters in one building. Oysters are farmed across the bay and eaten grilled in the shell on Miyajima's main street from October. Tsukemen here means cold noodles with a chilli-heavy dipping sauce, a summer dish invented in the city. Momiji manju, maple-leaf cakes filled with bean paste, are made on Miyajima and now come deep-fried as well.

The Inland Sea climate is mild and comparatively dry: January highs near 10°C with rare snow, August above 33°C with humidity. Oysters are harvested from October to March, and Miyajima's oyster festival falls in February. The tide is the thing to plan for on Miyajima — at high water the torii stands in the sea, at low water you can walk out to it, and both are worth seeing, so check the tide table before choosing a ferry. The peace ceremony is held on August 6. Autumn colour in Miyajima's Momijidani valley peaks in mid to late November. The Shimanami is best cycled in May or October.

Trains and trams. Hiroshima's tram network reaches the park and the ferry terminal, the main line runs east to Onomichi and west toward Yamaguchi, and Miyajima is a short JR ferry from Miyajimaguchi. Nothing here needs a car.

The exception is the Shimanami Kaido, the cycling route across the islands from Onomichi to Shikoku — which needs a bicycle rather than a car and is one of the best rides in Asia. Bicycles rent at either end and can be returned at the other. Cars are permitted on the bridges but the point of the route is that it was built with a cycle lane the whole way.

A first visit is the Peace Park and Miyajima, in that order, with a night on the island. The museum is one of the most affecting places in the country and it deserves an unhurried morning and a quiet afternoon afterwards rather than a rush to the next thing. The island in the evening, after the ferries have gone, is the counterweight.

A second visit should be the islands and the bicycle. The Shimanami Kaido crosses six islands on a chain of bridges between Onomichi and Shikoku, takes a long day or a comfortable two, and passes through fishing villages, citrus groves and shipyards. Onomichi at the near end is a steep town of temples, alley staircases and second-hand bookshops, and it is worth a night on its own.