Shishiiwa Observatory

This guide to Shishiiwa Observatory on Miyajima near Hiroshima starts inside the ropeway's upper terminal, where a hands-on workshop called Heart in Momiji hands you a maple-leaf mold and an iron griddle to bake your own cake. It traces the two-stage ropeway ride that gets you there, running since nineteen fifty-nine from small eight-seat cabins into a thirty-person cabin swinging alone over open air, and introduces the crouching gray rock that gave the station its lion-shaped name. Along the way you will hear about the coin-operated telescopes and the deer that wander up this high, ignoring the whole show.