A trip to Hiroshima might surprise you. This easygoing, modern city has must-try eats (seriously, it’s the place for oysters and okonomiyaki), a bustling bar and nightlife scene in Nagarekawa, leafy parks, and UNESCO sites close at hand. It’s also a quick ferry ride to Itsukushima island where you can marvel at one of Japan’s most iconic shrines with its bright red Torii Gate that almost looks as if it’s floating on water. But no visit to the city is complete without a trip to Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park, which sits on 30 acres of a once-busy neighbourhood leveled by the atomic bomb in 1945. The site contains an affecting museum and a contemplative park with more than 70 different monuments, including the continuously burning Flame of Peace and the Children’s Peace Monument, covered in thousands of bright paper cranes folded by children around the world.