姫路城 stands on top of a large hill, her walls and turrets stretching out over a huge area and encompassing several parks and gardens. In fact, it's a very popular 花見 (はなみ - hanami - cherry blossom viewing) spot and the entire castle grounds were heaving with crowds trying to find a good spot for their picnic blankets. Once they were settled, I'm sure they would have had a hard time keeping their eyes off the White Heron. 姫路城 is made of wood, so the reason every part of it is covered with white plaster is to help with fireproofing.
Of all the castles in Japan, it's probably the best preserved and it's considered a national treasure for this reason. Unfortunately, as you can see by the crane in the pictures, 姫路城 is about to undergo restoration until 2014 so until then you won't be able to see her in all her glory.
As far as I know, parts will be open so you can still visit, but the queue to get in one last time was still amazing. The restoration is being done to fix regular wear and tear rather than actual damage - 姫路城 was lucky to escape ever being attacked.
Perhaps the reason is the castle defences putting people off, which you'll understand if you go inside. The path into the keep itself was designed to be as labyrinthine and confusing as possible - a series of twists and turns that force you to spiral around the castle, with lots of dead ends and dummy paths.
The idea of this was to buy time for the defenders to get organised, split up the attacking army and pick them off one by one while they wandered around confused. There are holes in the walls that would have been used by archers for this purpose, as well as throwing stones and pouring boiling water on anyone unfortunate enough to be underneath.
If the army managed to get inside the keep itself, they would then be faced with having to fight their way up flight after flight of steep stairs, each of which could be closed over and be sealed off to buy more time for the defenders.
The losses the attackers would sustain fighting an army who constantly had the higher ground was probably too much to bear. 姫路城 was never tested, but walking through, I imagine it would have been pretty effective.
There's lots to see in there - all kinds of information about what an army would have faced if they tried their hand, artifacts from the time and the full history of when it was built and what it was used for.
The view from the top is amazing as well - it's apparently almost 100m above sea level.
Renovations or no, I would definitely recommend a trip out to 姫路 on your travels to visit 姫路城 - having such an impressive and ancient piece of history on your doorstep is something you don't come across every day. And if you don't want to pay the price of admission, you could always bring an army with you. Best of luck with that!
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