30 Less-Travelled Places for Women in 2024

Less-travelled places for women in Asia and Oceania  

8. Hiroshima, Japan

Recommended by Norie Quintos, member of JourneyWoman partner Adventure Travel Conservation Fund (ACTF) 

In 1945, the US dropped the world’s first atomic bomb on the Japanese city of Hiroshima, obliterating some 78,000 people and unleashing a radioactive weapon so potent it sickened and killed inestimable numbers more for generations. Miraculously, what emerged from the ashes was a new city bent toward regeneration, not retaliation, and on finding peace, not making war.

In the current world climate of natural and manmade disasters, there is no more relevant place to visit than this city of hope, a symbol of the best of humanity overcoming the worst. The Peace Park complex, a UNESCO World Heritage site, is a place of remembrance. The museum and monuments help give the enormity of the event a human scale. More than anything it holds the hope of the children of Hiroshima, Japan, and throughout the globe—a powerful reminder of the true cost of war, and especially nuclear war. On the stone tablet under the bell of the Children’s Peace Monument is written, “This is our cry. This is our prayer. For peace in the world.”

It may come as a surprise, but 78 years later, Hiroshima is a lively modern city known for its food. Leave room in your belly for the city’s version of okonomiyaki, a layered savoury pancake. It also has a second World Heritage site, the Itsukushima shrine on the island of Miyajima. The large red ceremonial gate that seemingly floats in the bay is one of Japan’s most iconic images. It’s part of a complex that makes up a waterside Shinto shrine dating from the 12th century. Together they illustrate the Japanese concept of beauty, shinden-zukuri, which marries nature with human creativity.

If you do go, take the time to learn something about the culture, and drink in the beauty created when humanity is at one with nature. Don’t just do it for the ‘gram. 

How to make it a longer stay:  Join a small group tour in Japan with Wild Women Expeditions, Girls Guide to the World or Trafalgar.