Bike Ride & Ikebana Downtown 9/13

I was invited to attend an ikebana display downtown today, so Stan and I decided to ride our bicycles -- it's a nice early Autumn day, and the weather has cooled down a bit recently. We're riding over the Hwy 188 bridge that leads into downtown.

It's high tide and you can see the boats tied up at the seawall.

One of the beautiful Iwakuni manhole covers along the sidewalk. It features the moon over Iwakuni Castle, the famous Kintai Bridge, and cormorant fishing, with a stylized cherry blossom in the center.

Sidewalk in front of Fuji Grand department store downtown Iwakuni. We'll cross the main street here to our left and ride for a few more blocks. Motorcycles park on the sidewalks, but must be walked into the street where they ride in the "bike" lane. Bicycles of course, ride with pedestrians on sidewalks.

Here we are at the Civic Center across from the Police Station. I understood that the ikebana exhibit was here. We've attended many art shows as well as a Japanese language class in this building over the years. Read about the fascinating art of ikebana here: http://www.japan-zone.com/culture/ikebana.shtml

Unfortunately, once we got inside, we found out that we should have gone to the Iwakuni Sinfonia. Oops, one of the hazards of not being able to read Japanese! Well, it's only a few blocks away, but we must find a way across the wide downtown train tracks, without having to ride down to the station and cross under the tunnel to the other side. Either that, or go up and over the steep crossing near the "curly" bridge, which is too steep for me to push my heavy bike up. So, another adventure . . .