This is the bell tower on the grounds.
This is Landon's new "funny face". He loves cracking the girls up:) Next to him is armour that a guard or soldier would have worn.
A view from the Observatory Deck of the castle. 
One building on the the castle grounds was being used as a statue museum. This museum is said to be the only one of its kind. All the statues we saw were hollow and were created much like the Statue of Liberty- using the same techniques.
Landon was trying to look like the statue, which is of a man boxing. He's such a little character!
This was one of the many statues we saw. I don't know what this statue is called because everything was written in Kangi, but it's certainly not the god of love.
Driving up to the castle. The grounds were decked out in azaleas. As you can see, they are all beginning to bloom.
One of the two doors that sit side-by-side to enter the castle. Pretty big! 
A picture of the castle through a window in one of the nearby towers.
Tuesday, April 13, 2010:Tuesday morning we took off on our first official road trip in Japan. We headed to the city of Shimabara- about a 2 1/2 hour drive. The drive was beautiful and we got to see some of the countryside. Our first stop was Shimabara Castle. The castle was built in the mid 1600's and it has survived many wars, earthquakes and a tsunami that killed more than 10,000 people in the city! The castle sits up very high which is what saved it; however, the tsunami was so big it reached the foot of the castle.
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