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After we crossed the street from the Peace Memorial Park, we got on the street trolley to head to Hiroshima Station.

We were trying to decide whether to go out to eat or just head over to the 7-11 where we were going to meet the pink Willer Bus that was going to take us back to Tokyo.  We had about two hours to kill before our bus was due to arrive, so we had time to eat at a restaurant.  But, we had only budgeted for eating out at Okonomimura and at the sukiyaki restaurant.  We voted on it and decided that we had better play it safe and arrive at the 7-11 an hour early rather than eat out and rush to meet our bus.

The family on the street trolley as we head back to Hiroshima Station to get our luggage.

We had been in Hiroshima and Miyajima for two days.  They were amazing days, full of emotional highs and lows.  Miyajima was something out of a magical dream, and parts of Hiroshima were something out of a nightmare.  Through these experiences, we had all grown immensely. 

The children arrived in this city very scared of how people would treat them.  While we were here, we all had many wonderful experiences that showed us over and over that the Japanese people have forgiven the atrocities of the atomic bomb that ravaged this city.  The kids left this city feeling something very different:  HOPE.  The city of Hiroshima is a symbol to the world of hope, forgiveness, and peace.

I read somewhere as I was preparing for our trip that many tourists breeze through Hiroshima and don't really take the time to receive the gift that this city offers to its visitors.  The gift of Hiroshima is hope.  We didn't feel like we spent enough time here--certainly not at Miyajima--but because of the experiences that we had, we still left with our hearts full of the gift of Hiroshima.  We will carry that gift of hope in our hearts forever.

We got our luggage out of the lockers at Hiroshima Station and walked around it for a bit looking for a store to buy diapers.  We had two diapers left for Kirstina, and we still had a long night ahead.  It took us a little while, but we found a store and bought diapers.  Then, we made our way to our bus stop at 7-11.  It was about 3 blocks from Hiroshima Station.

As we were walking there, I pulled out the itinerary to double check the time for the bus to arrive.  I had it in my head that the bus was pulling out at 8:45 p.m., but when I double checked, the paper said that it was actually leaving at 7:45.  I looked at the current time--it was 7:35 p.m.!!  We had about two more blocks to go!  We all ran as quickly as we could and arrived at the bus just as they were loading the luggage.  Raymond got the luggage and kids loaded in the bus while I ran into the 7-11 and grabbed some quick dinner.  We barely, barely made our bus!!  Good thing we played it very safe and voted to arrive to the bus stop very early.  If we had eaten at a restaurant like we had discussed, we would have missed our bus!

We spent the night sleeping on the bus as we made the long drive back to Tokyo.  This bus ride was much more pleasant since the bus driver shut off the lights and didn't wake us up constantly.  We all slept fairly well considering we were on a bus.

At 8:30 a.m. on Sunday, March 8th, we arrived back in Tokyo and said good-bye to our pink bus. 

What a trip!  We were tired, spent, and sick of traveling.  So glad to be back in our own beds.  But, wow, what amazing memories we made.