Hiroshima

Belongings and testimony of the bomb's victims: a charred lunch box or a stopped watch, each shown with its owner's name. In school-trip season the entrance queue is long even on weekday mornings, so arriving at opening time pays off.

Jan Letzel, a Czech architect, designed this former industrial promotion hall, kept as the skeleton the blast left near ground zero. It became World Heritage in 1996. You cannot go inside, and the far riverbank gives the whole dome in one frame.

The corridors stand over the sea, so at high tide the halls seem to float, while low water lets you stroll out over the mud to the great torii. Check the tide table first; the island's visitor tax is collected with your ferry fare.

The peak at the heart of Miyajima. Even after the ropeway you climb another 30 minutes of rocky path to the summit. In the Reikado hall a fire said to have been lit by Kukai has never gone out, and the Peace Park's flame was kindled partly from it.

Miyajima's oldest temple, below Mount Misen. The handrail of the stone stair to the main hall is lined with sutra-engraved wheels, and turning them on the way up is said to equal reading the sutras. Allow about 20 minutes to walk there from the ferry pier.

A stroll garden the ruling Asano family began in 1620, with mountains and valleys shrunk to fit around a pond. The bomb flattened most of it before it was restored. A teahouse inside serves matcha and sweets you can sit down to.

The building right next to the Dome. Its rooftop deck is a sloping timber floor, and from the top you look down on the Dome and the Peace Park. Below, a glass shaft runs down the wall, and the paper crane you fold yourself can be dropped in to join the pile.

Twenty-odd griddle counters share the second to fourth floors of one building. With no partitions between them you can watch the next stall's hotplate, and a solo diner simply takes a single stool at the counter.

It sits inside Mazda's home plant, so you cannot wander in alone: the weekday-only tours need booking in advance. You pass old and current models and finish looking down on a working assembly line.

On the city's northwest slopes, three falls drop through the grounds, as the name says. Mossy stairs and stone Buddhas climb the hill, and even in the November maples it is far quieter than Miyajima. Water offered to the bomb's victims comes from these falls.

A port town squeezed between sea and mountain with 25 temples on its slopes, linked by a stone-stepped temple walk. A ropeway climbs to the top of Mount Senkoji. On Cat Alley, where many cats live, painted cat stones are set into the walls.

A retired submarine hauled whole onto dry land, open to walk through inside. The cramped bunks and the control room are left as they were. Entry is free, and Kure Station is a walk away.

Hundreds of wild rabbits roam this island; the boat from Tadanoumi port takes about 15 minutes. In wartime it was a poison-gas factory wiped from maps, and its museum tells that story. Most visitors buy rabbit food at the port kiosk before boarding.

A Fukuyama harbour that keeps its Edo-period look, a great stone lantern on the waterfront. In 1711 a Korean envoy praised the view from the Taichoro guest hall as the finest east of Korea. Miyazaki Hayao is said to have sketched out Ponyo while staying here.

A merchant quarter grown rich on salt and sake, nicknamed Aki's little Kyoto. Taketsuru Masataka, who founded Nikka whisky, was a son of the brewing family here, and their house still makes sake. A hilltop temple veranda looks over the tiled roofs.

A five-arched wooden bridge at Iwakuni, Yamaguchi Prefecture, first built in 1673. A typhoon washed it away in 1950 and it was rebuilt. Crossing costs a toll, and the park on the far side keeps a hall of white snakes.

A covered shopping arcade running straight on from the Peace Memorial Park's eastern edge, the heart of Hiroshima's shopping. Souvenir shops, clothes stores and an old bakery mix along it. On a rainy day it keeps you dry after the park.