Hotels near Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park

The Peace Memorial Park occupies 12 hectares of the delta that was once Nakajima, a dense commercial district of shops and homes destroyed on 6 August 1945. Rather than rebuild, the city set the ground aside as a memorial. The architect Kenzo Tange won the 1949 design competition and laid the park on a single axis linking the museum, the cenotaph and the Atomic Bomb Dome.

The Cenotaph for the A-bomb Victims holds a register of every confirmed name, now well past 300,000. The Flame of Peace has burned since 1964 and is intended to be extinguished only when the last nuclear weapon is gone. The Children's Peace Monument, raised for Sadako Sasaki, is surrounded by glass cases of folded paper cranes sent from schools worldwide. Entry to the park is free and open at all hours.

Pro Tip: Come at 7am. The park is empty, the light is low across the river, and you can read the monument inscriptions without moving around groups. Volunteer English-speaking guides gather near the rest house from mid-morning and are free.