Nagasaki

Nagasaki City

Lovely little city with lots of history. Nagasaki is really well marked with brown signs in English for all the tourist attractions and how far away they are. Take advantage of the streetcars. They are cheap, come pretty frequently and go all over.

to see:
A-bomb Museum
Peace Park
mountain viewing tower
Chinatown
Glover Park/Garden - skip it!
Shimabara - also nice.
Dejima
Urakami Cathedral

to stay:
Nagasaki Catholic Center (Youth Hostel)- ￥2700 yen a night, including breakfast (miso soup and onigiri). Tatami rooms with futon. Japanese and Western style showers and a hot soak tub. Really clean, nice and the staff speak English. But there's a midnight curfew. Only 5 mins from the Peace Park. Take the street car from the station and get off at the Peace Park stop (statue with finger pointing to the sky). From there walk up hill 15 minutes and you should see it - look for signs for Urakami Cathedral - the Catholic Center is right across the street. http://www.jyh.or.jp/english/kyushu/nagakatho/index.html
Ebisu Youth Hostel - close to Nagasaki station and very clean. Ask for the shared room as it's more expensive if you get singles. Around ￥2900 and boys get single rooms. Curfew: 11pm. http://www.jyh.or.jp/english/kyushu/ebisu/index.html
2 nice minshukus are Nishikiso and Tanpopo. Nishikiso is in a great location close to Chinatown and Tanpopo is further north near the Peace Museum. Both have very friendly owners and comfy rooms, and neither has a curfew. Both are around ￥4000/person/night.
http://www.jpinn.com/inn/15-5.html

Hirado Island

Hirado city is a quaint, but historical and pretty place with a cute shopping avenue, some sights (castle, pagoda, bay, etc.), and makes for at least a nice day trip. It was the first port open to foreigners (Dutch) in Japan, so it has quite a lot of history. For it's size, there are sooo many good restaurants, from Italian to Korean BBQ to curry pizzas to even a ranch that serves tacos. If you take the time to go into the non-city parts of the island itself, there are some great beaches (one of the top ten in Japan is here), decent onsens, and a few good mountains to trek up to take in the scenery. You can spend a full day in Hirado easy.
Sasebo may or may not be interesting depending on where you are currently living in Japan. If you like American navy guys a lot, you'll love Sasebo!

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