Sunday

What a long exhausting day!  And a rather sad day, too.  We went to see the Glover Gardens first.  He was a fellow who came here in the mid 1800s from Scotland and basically started the exportation of tea, started coal mining, and steam engines, bringing technology to Japan.  His house in these gardens is a mix of oriental and wooden. He became very wealthy by age 24.  He married a Japanese woman. We went up a kind of funicular, to his house with a lovely view of all harbour from there.  Then to,see China town and Confucius Shrine with seventy two statutes of his disciples. It was quite magnificent place. All red and gold.  Following this we went for lunch to the Best Western Hotel and it was a splendid lunch indeed. All cooked!  We spent the afternoon at the site of the atom bomb in 1945.  That was unpleasant and upsetting.  We got home at 5: 30 pm and then for dinner at 6:30.  This was in the hotel and was a Japanese meal...so very beautifully presented.    Much raw fish!  I must say it is highly over rated.  Today was very warm and humid. We have a free day tomorrow and I don't know what will be in store. Today I took an umbrella, a jacket and didn't take my walking poles, not wanting to try to manage them and an umbrella as well.  Should have had the walking sticks.  In a couple of days we meet our host family.