Hello. What an odd week it's been. It's hard to believe that it was only one week ago that I was on Sadogashima. But now I'm on Shikoku, in a town called Matsuyama, not far from where I'll be living for a few weeks as a farm worker. It rained yesterday, it's raining today. I think today I need to buy a pair of boots and a better rain jacket.
I left Sadogashima as planned Wednesday morning, taking an early ferry. From the ferry landing point of Joetsu, I went south-west on my bike, along the west coast of Japan. I was planning to go about 40 miles, to a spot on the map with a little camping symbol near the town of Asahi.
The first twenty miles were luxurious -- it was a warm, partly-sunny, partly-cloudy day, I still had that nice tail-wind, and also that stretch of road, highway 8, had a nice parallel bike path that went nearly 20 miles. It even had its own tunnels. So I clipped along nicely.
But for the second half, the luxurious bike lane ended. The last ten miles was possibly one of the top ten worst experiences of my life. For that stretch, much of it was through tunnels, literally no shoulder on the road, very busy with truck traffic in both directions. Some of the tunnels were nearly half a mile long, curvy, up-hill, the air brown with diesel exhaust, trucks whizzing by me at 60 mph, leaving me as much room as they could -- about three feet. In order to avoid one of the tunnels, I tried pushing my bike up a gravel road which went up the hill next to the tunnel opening, ignoring the "do not enter" sign. After a short while, the road stopped at a cement patch, which I am guessing was the roof of the tunnel. What a strange experience that was, to be standing above a busy highway, the sound of the traffic barely audible, with a lush hillside rising up on one side, and at the edge of the roof's gentle slope, a several-hundred foot drop to the ocean below. I could have tried pushing my bike through brush, but I didn't know how long I would have to go, or what kind of hill it might be, so I turned back, cursed fate a few times, and went through the tunnel.
Anyway, I survived! After I got through it, I had a bowl of ramen and some ice cream at a truck stop, and then found my camp spot -- a mostly deserted beach next to a commercial camp-ground, also empty. I saw another tent on the beach, but never saw the person who occupied it. During sunset, I could see that stretch of highway lit up with car lights and street lights, with a brown smear of smog hovering over it, stretching over the water.
The next day I said "to heck with this," and took the train directly to Kyoto. And it happened to rain that day, too. I cannot believe the luck I've had in avoiding bad weather. I arrived at the Kyoto Utano Youth Hostel about nine-ish, along with a pack of maybe twenty-five American middle-school students. I shared my room with three French guys who came to Japan to visit a relative, sight-see, and watch a few soccer games.
The next day was mine to just wander around and explore -- I wasn't planning to meet Nobuyuki until the next day. I spent a good two and a half hours at Ninnaji, which just happened to be only a mile away from the hostel -- originally a center for Japanese royalty (my understanding of Japanese history is so bad!) but now a buddhist temple. Unlike Nikko, I really enjoyed this bit of tourism. For one thing, the admission was 500 yen, not the 1100 or so of Nikko's Toshogu, and for another thing, it was peaceful. The buildings were graceful rather than ornate, there were places to just sit and relax, plenty of room to just wander around, it wasn't especially crowded, there were nice gardens -- some of them stark and simple, some of them lush and green. Most of the other visitors were Japanese high-school students, probably on a field trip.
Anyway, it was a good day. Later that day, I stayed a bit at a pond near the hostel and watched kids fishing for crayfish. They tied a few yards of string to a stick, and then tied a bit of food (maybe dried fish or squid) to the end of the string, along with a small rock. I never actually saw one being caught, but they also had nets, so I'm assuming when the crayfish latched on to the bit of dried fish, they pulled it out of the water and scooped it up with the net. There was also a guy there about my age, doing the same thing as the kids.
The following day I spent with Nobuyuki a guy of about 27, who lives and works near Kyoto. He has done extensive bike travel, and was studying English. Mostly we wandered around, visited a few tourist spots and chatted, mostly in English, a bit in Japanese. He was getting ready for an exam in English the following Monday, so I think he liked the practice. He was also getting ready for an uphill bike race the following weekend, so we did a lot of biking. At one stretch of uphill road, feeling a bit cocky, I said "Let's go fast," and he pretty much left me behind. I caught up with him at the top of the hill, huffing and puffing, where he was waiting for me. So maybe if I ever want to bike-race, I actually need to train for it.
On Sunday I set out for Wakayama, where I caught the ferry to Shikoku. It was a good biking day -- by dark I rode about 60 miles. Finding a camp site was a bit tricky -- I tried one off-road which looked like it led to some woodsy areas, but no luck. It actually led to a small neigborhood next to the hillside. It wasn't a gated community, in the American sense (there was no gate) but it had a similar feel. I saw an older woman walking her dog, and asked her if there might be a camp site nearby, but she said no. As I was trying to figure out how to leave and get back to the main road, she watched me suspiciously until I left. I also considered sleeping at a "love-hotel" (for some reason, there were plenty of them along this stretch of road) but decided to save that experience for some other time. I asked someone waiting at a bus stop, and she directed me to a small park, but it was too bright and visible, and too near houses. So I went back to the highway, considering maybe biking the last 35 miles in the dark, but I happened to see some stairs leading up a hill. It looked like it might be a shrine, and it was, with a perfect place to camp -- clean, out of the way, not especially populated.
Well, I only have a few minutes left, but yesterday I got up early, made a quick prayer at the shrine for no rain, and set out. It rained anyway, but it was a light rain, and I never got especially wet. On the ferry I met up with a bicyclist, who had ridden all the way from Sapporo (we had actually met the day before, at a convenience store, and he asked me if I wanted to split a hotel room. I was feeling stingy, and decided not to spend the $35 or so, so declined.) While talking, a woman approached us and asked where we were going, etc. When she heard I was going to Ehime prefecture, she said "That's where I live!" and offered to give me a ride to Muchacha-en, where I'll be staying.
My bike, in its bike-bag would just barely not fit in the trunk, so it ended up being me and the bike in the back seat, for a two and a half-hour drive from one end of the island to the other. Keiko and Kenji (it was actually his car -- he took Keiko's volunteering of his car very gracefully) conversed a bit, had ramen, and then dropped me off at the youth hostel in Matsuyama. So last night I stayed at a hostel, and right now I am using the hostel's computer, wearing out my welcome. So today I'm going to go shopping for boots and maybe slightly better rain clothes, and then go by car to Akehama. They're not expecting me until tomorrow at Muchachaen, so I think I'll find a place to stay around there tonight. It's raining, so camping doesn't sound especially fun.
I think this is the end of the second part of this trip -- I don't think I'll do much biking after this, except daytrips exploring. I'm not sure what in the world to expect at Muchacha-en. I'm pretty sure it'll be much more work-oriented, but we'll see. I think I will stay there about three weeks, and then get ready to return to the Tokyo area, for my trip back. Ok, have to go.