The Eggplant Curse

Some closure?

2010-09-30T04:38:00.007-04:00

Well, it's 4:45am, jet lag is a pain, and at this point I'm writing this more for my own benefit than anything else... However if anyone is still checking this, enjoy!

Firstly - the final map (a big two days worth of riding!)

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where from Tokushima, we took an 18-hr ferry right in to Tokyo. (Cheating? Perhaps! The ferry meant we got to spend the last two weeks in Kyushu and Shikoku, rather than in the suburbs of Tokyo.)

Secondly - I'm counting up the kilometres.
July, in Hokkaido: 1839.14km.(July 2 - July 27)
August, Honshu, Oma to Hiroshima: 1990.63 (July 31 - August 30)
September, Hiroshima -> Shimonoseki, Kyushu, Shikoku: 1314.87 (Sept 2 - Sept 18)
GRAND TOTAL (Since the calculator application is already open)
5144.64km
with the longest day being 139.84km.

And, I guess a few more pictures while I'm at it:

-Matt at Cape Muroto, Shikoku's second most southerly point, and a fine stand-in for Cape Sata I might add, which ended up being too far and quite frankly not interesting enough to be worth going to.

Our final campsite on the road - sheltered, serenaded by the crashing surf, with a beautiful natural rock formation a stone's throw away! The only problem was the thousands of weird bugs running around everywhere. Technically they weren't "bugs" as they had about a dozen legs each, but they weren't centipedes either which was fortunate....I had dubbed them "Land Shrimp." They were large, creepy, and unexpectedly slow to escape my stomping foot. (Gross.)

-Looking inland up one of Shikoku's alluring, mysterious valleys. Damn it...next time.

And, lastly

-Our FINAL night on the road. We spent the night at this 24hr internet cafe before getting on the ferry the next morning. If you can get past the cigarette smoke and lack of actual GOOD video games (grindy Japanese MMOs were all we had to go with) it was actually a pretty good place to spend a night!

Anyway, at this point after 2 weeks of no updates I imagine I'm mostly writing to myself, but if anyone IS out there, thanks again for reading, and stay tuned for a comprehensive ranking of Japan's various convenience store chains.

And then, a post not about video games!

2010-09-13T20:09:00.012-04:00

As I mentioned earlier, we've reached Kochi, which is regrettably our last stop before we wind down the trip in Tokyo!
Map:

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To all you Matt Peterkin fans: yes, he is still alive, he's sitting next to me eating peanuts and drinking a bottled latte or something.

In any case, the days since Kyushu have been some of the most exciting, cycling-wise, of the trip. In a previous post, I mentioned the active volcano Sakurajima, which, in my own words, "supposedly dumps ash on you now and then."
Our day started with a ferry ride across Kagoshima harbor and a ride around the foot of the volcano.

It was a pretty enough ride as it was, however, when we got to the "lava observatory," things got interesting.

The mountain rumbled, and smoke began to pour out the top! We observed this for a little while, until we actually started to feel flecks of ash hitting us from above.

Figuring it would be prudent to leave before the ash-fall became too heavy, we departed. Naturally, the ash-fall then became too heavy.

I had to tie a towel around my face to keep the ash out, but the going was still slow due to poor visibility. (Matt, who is too cool for even sunglasses, had a less enjoyable time!)

Fortunately this was not the city-destroying type of eruption and we managed to escape the mountain without being incinerated by lava or cooked via pyroclastic flow.

Arguably the alternative wasn't much better, as I then proceeded to take us up the absolute steepest hill I could find on the island. (Check point B on the map in terrain view for an idea.)

Exhausted, caked in sweat and ash, it already seemed like a long time since we'd woken up fresh in a business hotel that morning. Fortunately a Japanese bath awaited us at the campsite!
Here we met Eric and Kayoko, veterans of a far more impressive Lhasa - Kathmandu bike trek, with whom it was a joy to hang out with for a bit. (I'm absolutely doing that some day!)

The next morning found us in an incredible landscape - a volcanic plateau (called the "Ebino Tableland") which somehow felt (and was, really) miles above the rest of the landscape. Clear, cool air, a stark blue sky, and low, scrubby vegetation; completely different than the typical Japanese landscape we've seen so much of.

After scrambling around on the rocks, checking out some of the caldera lakes and taking in the view, we screamed down the other side of the mountain and soon found ourselves on the coast once again.
We found a beautiful free campsite by the water, and the next morning I got up super early to watch a Pacific Ocean sunrise. A uniquely Japanese sunrise, accompanied by music...

I can't really explain why the town would play music on an empty beach at 6 in the morning, but there you have it.

Further on up the coast, we tackled another ridiculous hill, this time with the road looking more like a paved hiking trail than a national highway..

and when our planned camping spot turned out to be ON TOP OF A FREAKING MOUNTAIN we elected to move on, and instead found a beautiful little park in a tiny fishing town. Another chance for a sunrise...

The best part about getting up so early and watching the sun rise is that you easily pass out from tiredness by 8:30pm. Life is good!

Anyhow, a short ferry hop landed us here in Shikoku, and after the usual beach sunrise/sunset combo, here we are!

Kochi is a nice, laid back city with an absolutely beautiful castle dating to the 17th century. A good place to take a break before the final leg of our journey.

Hard to believe, but a mere 3 days of riding (only two nights camping!) remain to us before we hop on another ferry (this one not such a short hop) and head for Tokyo!

Thus, this may end up being our final entry from the road (unless Matt posts tonight!) after which point this blog will focus on the various Japanese toilets and convenience stores.

Thanks again to all for reading and so long for now!

Kagoshima Nights

2010-09-13T04:46:00.010-04:00

The scene? Kagoshima, Japan's most southerly city. A city of palm lined avenues and dark, seedy alleyways. A city of hot, steamy days and long, raucous nights. A city under constant threat of total volcanic annihilation.

-Sakurajima, as viewed from Kagoshima ferry port

This constant reminder of the frailty of human existence makes Kagoshima's citizens among Japan's most uninhibited; most eager to embrace life and all of its varied experiences.*

Armed with this knowledge, Matt and I ventured out in to the night, hoping to find an exciting night spot and capture a piece of that recklessness for ourselves.
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As usual, we failed completely at this, and so instead ended up at an arcade where we played Street Fighter IV for 2 hours.

-Matt, eager to embrace a Dragon Punch

This arcade in particular was medium-sized; two floors, with an interesting decor - blown up pictures of American newspaper sports articles and other weird stuff.

Normally when entering an arcade, in order to reach the floor with the cool, manly games like Street Fighter and Melty Blood, you need to pass thru dozens of "Crane Games" where the objective is to win a cute stuffed animal or something by manipulating a mechanical arm.

-Some of my crane game winnings. The key is actually to use the arm to knock the prizes in to the hole; the arm is usually far too weak to actually pick anything up

Anyway, as I was walking thru this particular set of crane games, something caught my eye:

A SLUM DANK uniform? Like a moth to a smoldering volcanic crater, the attraction was fatal. I HAD to have one.

In retrospect, what was it that made this so attractive? Was it a uniquely Japanese basketball-related souvenir? (Slam Dunk, the manga these jerseys were inspired by) Was it the the silly misspelling? In any case, while Matt was upstairs being pummeled by Japanese kids at SFIV,

...I was nudging my prize closer and closer to the hole, 100 yen at a time. Roughly 2400 yen later (and I'll let you convert that yourselves)....

...on a steamy night, with a volcano breathing down your neck, you throw caution to the wind and live life to its fullest.

*(I made this up)

Also: we're in Kochi on Shikoku. More later!

A few shots from the road

2010-09-07T22:15:00.008-04:00

Alright, time to shut up and post pictures:

-The definitive Eggplant Curse stance on the nuclear issue: It never hurts to not nuke people.

-The Shimonoseki Straits from a distance.

-A misty mountain valley. (This was right after we spent 40 minutes huddling in a parking shelter waiting out a downpour)

-Approaching top of the Aso crater, the landscape becomes decidedly Hokkaido-like (barren, wind-swept and cloudy)

-Glamour shot! With the three active volcanoes of the Aso caldera in the background

-"What? I have to go UP that?" The Hitoyoshi Loop Bridge - all things considered, the gradient wasn't too bad and there was ample shoulder space. (And the whole typhoon rain thing kept the sun off). All in all I've done worse climbs.

If the rain clears up today, we may venture out (it's hard to venture out anywhere when you're in an internet cafe drinking free green tea and corn chowder) and take a picture or two of Sakurajima, which is an active active volcanoe - the kind that supposedly dumps ash on you now and then. Until then, signing off!

Nihongo de hanashite iru

2010-09-07T03:40:00.004-04:00

A couple of conversations in Japanese
(With my translation of how each sentence would probably sound in English in brackets)

Scene 1: Yesterday evening, a dreary, slightly rainy campsite outside the town of Hitoyoshi, our tent is up and we're eating convenience store food

Woman at Campsite: Ame ga, daijoubu desu ka?
(Is it OK that it's raining?)
Me: Chotto! Chotto ame desu. Daijobu desu.
(A little! It is a little rain. It's OK.)
WoC: I forget the entire wording of this sentence, but picked out the important words: Ashita(tomorrow) and Taifu(typhoon)
Me: *incoherent astonished noises*
WoC: Domo!
(See ya later, suckers!)

Scene 2: This afternoon, after walking in to a convenience store, completely drenched, to buy a hot can of coffee

Me, attempting to project false confidence: Chotto ame ga arimasu!
(There is a little rain!)
Cashier woman: Sou desu ne!
(Yes indeed, there obviously is)
*the transaction is completed*
Cashier: Ki o tsukete!
(Have fun out there, sucker)

Despite hitting the tailings of said typhoon right as we entered the city, we have safely reached Kagoshima. I'm now standing in the lobby of the hotel in my biking tights, waiting for all of my clothes to wash. Matt is watching Japanese TV in his underwear. We're taking the day off here tomorrow, so pics and maps will be up then!

Oh, and happy Labor Day!

UPDATE: Map!

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Take a look at the Terrain view at around point E - very cool landscape. (pics coming)

Strait from Shimonoseki

2010-09-03T08:08:00.003-04:00

It's going to be ANOTHER short update - more to come when we're not on computers using Internet Explorer 6 or planning on going to sleep at 9:30.

Two days of hot, traffic-heavy riding (with an enchanting evening sandwiched in between, but that story shall be told later on) have found us in Shimonoseki, on the very tip of Honshu. Tomorrow we strike out for Kyushu, the southern-most of Japan's main islands, where I'm sure the temperatures will drop down to a reasonable level in short order.

Our plan as of now is to head for Kagoshima (where we should arrive in 4 days), take a break, and then head for Cape Sata - Japan's most southerly point (of the main islands anyway).

Then we head back North and East, ride the southern coast of Shikoku along the Pacific Ocean, and then attempt to catch an 18-hr ferry from Tokushima all the way back to Tokyo, which, if luck is with usm, will occur by the　17th or 18th.

Confused by all these place names? More google mapas will be posted! Like I said...IE6, sorry.

Will check in after a few days!

My Deer Friends

2010-09-01T07:51:00.024-04:00

Since I seem to have become the city correspondent and Zack the road correspondent, it seems I have some catching up to do.

Since I last posted we've been through Kyoto, and now it's our last night here in Hiroshima and we've seen and eaten quite a few things. Unfortunately I haven't had the time to sit down and write anything about them, mostly because the places we've been staying have been pretty busy, so I feel bad tying up the computer for hours. There is of course the Internet cafes, but trying to accomplish anything with free soft servce icecream available is almost impossible.

Japan has still been treating us well. Both Kyoto and Hiroshima are a lot more touristy than we're used to. I think my Japanese has actually gotten worse since we arrived in Kyoto as it seems that almost everyone can speak some english, all the signs have english translations, and we no longer get excited and yell "White guy!" when one walks past.

But with the tourists come the tourist attractions, and there have been no shortage of temples, restaurants and various other sights to be seen.

We headed to Kiyomizu-dera on our first day in Kyoto which was pretty impressive. After a long walk through a massive greaveyard in the blistering heat, we headed into the basement of the temple. We weren't even sure what we were going to see, but there was a line so we stood in it.

It turns out that we weren't actually supposed to see much of anything. The basement of the temple was completely and utterly dark. We stumbled along the corridor using the handrail for guidance, turn after turn I kept expecting my eyes to adjust and to see... something, but there really was nothing, just suprisingly cool temperatures and crushing darkness. Eventually we twisted around another corner to find a rock, dully illuminated and on something that allowed it to spin. I gave it a spin and made my way back out into the blinding daylight. Even though I have literally no idea what the significance of it all was, it was an interesting experience.

Heading further into the temple gave us a fantastic view of the city while we looked at the various charms available, including one specifically for leg muscles, which seems particularely well suited for us.

Coming down the other side of the temple we saw the three streams of spring water that give the temple it's name. The three streams of water are said to provide you with widsom, health and longevity, but some people consider drinking from all three to be greedy. I went with the middle one, and have no idea which of the three it was. I also paid two hundred yen for a plastic cup and stood in a line in the blistering heat for fifteen minutes to do it, so let's hope it was the wisdom one.

Our next day in Kyoto took us out to a zen garden that backed onto a bamboo forest. The carefully manicured garden, as well as the rock garden within it was impressive, but somehow I found the simplicity of a forest full of bamboo even more conductive to quiet contemplation than the zen garden we had walked through to get to it.

On our way out of the bamboo, a Japanese man stopped us and asked us each to write something in a notepad he had. He asked us to write any english proverb we could think of, which is surprisingly hard to come up with on the spot, if anyone has any suggestions let us know.. it would be nice to be prepared in the unlikely even that it happens again. If I remember correctly, Zack wrote "It's raining cats and dogs" and I wrote "Do or do not, there is no try". Either way he seemed appreciative.

We made our way across the nearby river and after a 30 minute hike up a mountain we arrived at the the monkey park, which actually turned out being worth the hike. Not only did we get to see monkeys, but we had a chance to feed them too. They seemed much happier than the monkeys stuck in a cage that we saw in Hokkaido. Jumping in and out of the nearby pool and lying aroud in the shade, they had it pretty good up there.

Most of the rest of our time in Kyoto was spent doing what we do best. Wandering around the city with no clear goals, only to end up at at an arcade or an Internet cafe. The city proper does seem quite nice, but doesn't have much of a personality of it's own. The one interesting section is the typical night life area where a quiet river runs down the middle of a street lined with neon signs. Hundreds of people slowly walking along enjoying the warm night, past places that somehow all seem to remain empty.

There's probably more that I'm forgetting, but due to the aforementioned bike touring time compression problem, it already feels like Kyoto was months ago.

Several long days later, and we're now in Hiroshima. While there's not nearly as much to see here as there was in Kyoto I'm really becoming fond of this place. It's touristy but not quite so much as Kyoto was. It seems to retain more of a Japanese feel, while still offering all the ameneties of a modern city.

While it feels a little bit awkward referring to something like this as a "tourist attraction" Hiroshima is of course known for being destroyed by a nuclear bomb on August 6th, 1945 and while the city has been completely rebuilt now, the A-bomb dome was left standing, and is continually preserved as a world heritage site in the state it was in after the explosion.

The peace park, the A-Bomb dome, and the Peace Memorial Museum are all well worth seeing and while from what I've read there was some debate about whether or not to leave the building standing, I have to say that it really does make you stop and think. Every time we have gone downtown we walk through the park, and every time I see the dome I'm reminded of what happened. Especially after seeing everything in the museum it's not exactly an easy thing to think about, but it's not something that should be forgotten.

Being here in person gives you a much more tangible idea of just how terrifying nuclear weapons are, especially when you factor in that the bomb dropped on Hiroshima was considered small, by today's standards. I'll leave it at that, as this is really a whole other topic. Suffice it to say that it was one of the most memorable things I've seen in Japan.

Today being our last full day in Hiroshima, we made the trek out to the ferry station largely on the recommendation of Saeko and Dominic who highly recommended the fresh water eel that the area is famous for.

It was definitely worth the trip, thanks for the tip! I managed to track down some additional eel in bun format, which was also quite tasty.

Since we were right beside the ferry terminal, we made our way to Miyajima to see what it was all about. It ended up being a nice enough place. Had we been so inclined we could have hiked up the mountain on one of many hiking paths, or taken a cable car up to the top but we instead spent some time checking out the local craft shops, and the scenic spots closer to sea level.

Probably the most interesting thing about the island was the deer that seem to inhabit the town. While they are wild deer they're completely used to people, and more or less do their own thing and ignore us, except when they're trying to steal our bags and eat our maps.

We then made our way back to the hostel, did what bike maitenance we had to and headed out for Okonomiyaki, which is apparently famous in Hiroshima. It's sort of... well, it's whatever you want, all mixed together with noodles and fried into a sort of pancake with poor structural integrity. Sorry, I'm running out of time again and that's about the best explanation I can think of right now. This particular one had cheese, corn, squid, pork and some other things I can't remember buried inside.

I probably left some things out, but it's getting late so that's going to have to be all for now. We head out bright and early tomorrow morning, so once again this will probably be the last update for a few days. I'm not even entirely aware of where we're going at this point, but I'm sure Zack will fill you in.

One of those quick posts with a map and no pictures

2010-08-30T07:02:00.005-04:00

We've safely arrived in Hiroshima! And are hanging out in an internet cafe that offers free soft-serve ice cream AND cigarette smoke! Life is good.

Map:

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And maybe a couple of bonus pictures after all. Not much to say here as of yet, Matt still has some Kyoto pictures he's holding on to, and we'll undoubtedly take more over the next couple of days. Hey, it's almost September?

-One of the nicer free campsites. I was about 5 minutes too lazy to catch the sunrise..

-and a bike path.

More to come..

Tottori Awesome

2010-08-27T01:01:00.010-04:00

We've returned to the Japan Sea coast and reached the town of Tottori (tee hee) which is famous for having a large sand dune.

....

Map:

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The theme, as ever, has been a combination of muderous heat and numerous climbs. A few highlights from along the way:

-Meeting a courier on the way out of Kyoto. He'd actually been to Toronto to participate in the Courier World Championships or something, and knew a couple of Toronto's prominent couriers...kinda neat

-More excellent seashore camping,

-Meeting a gentleman doing the same trip as us, but on foot! Due to my inability to remember names after hearing them once, I can't remember if his name was Yamazaki or Tomozaki, but he asked to be called "Zack" which was pretty sweet. We Zacks just don't stay in one place, yknow...

-Beatiful quiet rural valley, reached of course with the blood and sweat drawn over numerous climbs. In a sign of the relentless passage of time, we're starting to see the rice crops being harvested - a sad sight, for not only does it mean our trip is drawing near its conclusion, but also that the scenery will be much less nice with endless green fields giving way to stubbly harvested yellow everywhere.

-And finally, truly one of the most beautiful sunsets I've ever seen. My worse-than-amateur photographic skills hardly do it justice. Picture a perfect red sphere - as though taken right off the flag - slowly sinking below the horizon. Trademark whining and sarcasm aside, every now and then you experience a moment that reminds you just what a privilege making a trip like this really is.

The goal is to be in Hiroshima on the 30th of August. Hiroshima had always been - not the end point of the trip, but rather the goal; thus is it very exciting to be nearing it at last. Our route after that will depend on such delightful considerations as remaining time and money, but the trip thus far has been fantastic, and thank you all for continuing to read us!

The View from the Top

2010-08-23T07:16:00.008-04:00

Well, I blew my clever post title on the last one, so here we are, once again, from Kyoto, this time with pictures!

Some notable moments from the trek here:

-The pass over the Japan Alps, the name of which escapes me. At 1780m, it might be my highest pass summited, and was certainly Matt's as well!

-The aforementioned view. While screaming down the other side of the pass, we actually passed some more wild monkeys, and regrettably scared them off while a Japanese cyclist was trying to photograph them. Sorry :/
The campsite on the other side of the pass was probably the best yet - minutes from a great restaurant and onsen, and high enough altitude for it to drop below 25 degrees at night. When you can slog up a pass that high, and then get a bath and a meal and a good night's sleep, you feel like you may be doing this the right way.

-24 hours, 110km, 37 degrees and several climbs later, all of that good feeling had diminished when we reached our intended campsite only to find it closed. And being thunderstormed on. This turned out alright however. We got clean in the downpour, took shelter in the wash station, and camped for free on soft spongy grass.

-After a murderous climb, which resulted in an excellent onsen but non-existent campground, we found an impromptu site in a ski area parking lot. Free, but we were feasted on by black flies. "Mushi ga, watashi o tabemashita." My japanese translation of "Bugs ate me."

-Our final day before reaching Kyoto found us at a campsite on the shore of the..big lake that's near Kyoto. Another name escaping me. A lake to swim in, a 7-11 within walking distance, and a bike path to follow the next morning, and the going is easy.

More Kyoto pictures to come soon. To Matt's Mom (and all his other various fans): Now that Matt knows that being photographed is expected of him by his loved ones, he may concede to be photographed more often. (It will also help that I found a fresh memory card for my camera and can start taking surprise pictures of him again.)

One does not simply coast in to Kyoto

2010-08-22T18:06:00.003-04:00

Another quick, lazy update - we've reached Kyoto, and since this computer actually has an english keyboard, I'm doing weird stuff like hitting shift-7 for apostrophes and pressing the semicolon key hoping to get the @ thingy.

The story of the past few days has been climbs - lots of them! - which are good, and extreme heat, which I am forced to admit, is crappy. When people said the heat would be bad here, I thought "how bad could it be?"" Important lesson: whenever you find yourself asking "How bad could it be?" stop, and reconsider your decisions. It's been around 36 - 37 degrees for the past few days, with one roadside thermometer even showing 40. In terms of causing your clothes to require washing immediately, and preventing sleep, this extreme heat may even be more inconvenient than rain!

Anyway, enough typing, on to what you've all been waiting for - the MAP:

View Larger Map

What, you thought I meant pictures? Those will be up soon.

Also, I popped the button off of my only pair of shorts, went to 7-11, bought a sewing kit (because of course they had one there) and sewed it back on myself. This is a huge accomplishment, and the final feather in my cap as an international, independent bicycle tourer.

Interesting Post Title

2010-08-17T06:58:00.015-04:00

If there's one thing I've learned about bike touring so far it's that it is impossible to keep track of time. Maybe partially because neither Zack or I wear a watch, maybe because the sun rises at 4am, or maybe because I sometimes don't have enough remaining calories to power my brain.

Whatever the cause, as I write this I truly have no idea what day of the week it is. I know the date, but only because I can see it on the screen. The past couple of weeks are pretty much just a jumble of random people and places in my memory.

Not that I'm complaining or anything as that's part of the fun of it all, it's just a long way of saying - sorry that everything I'm about to post is in entirely random order, and completely unorganized.

Now that that's out of the way let me say it's been a good... couple of weeks? six days? Well, it's been a good undetermined period of time.

Since we last posted a real update from Akita we've been through Niigata and now are in Matsumoto until tomorrow morning when we leave for Kyoto which should take about five days.

The ride from Akita to Niigata was pretty nice. Over almost entirely flat ground we made good time and didn't have too much trouble The scenery was nice but once you've seen one rice field... y'know. My new bike rack did in fact arrive as planned and doesn't appear to be made out of bamboo or anything so we're glad that's dealt with.

One memorable evening was the night before we arrived in Niigata. In what seems like a rare occurance in Japan, we had a clear sky during the sunset, and happened to be camped right on the beach, allowing us to watch the sunset from beginning to end.

As the sun sank below the horizon, we were shocked to see that there are actually stars visible from Japan. Generally it's been too cloudy to see much of anything, but it was a beautiful, warm, bug-free night and we were able to sleep in an open tent under the stars. If every night of camping was like that we would never have to stay in hostels.

Niigata itself seems like a nice enough place but there wasn't too much to do. It's primarily a beach town and as our only full day there was full of rain, there wasn't much point in heading to the beach. So we did what maitenance we needed to, tried a couple new restaurants, bought umbrellas and packed up for the trip to Matsumoto.

The trip through to Matsumoto was a little more scenic. As we turned away from the coast and made our way inland, the highways along the coast are replaced with roads through mountain valleys and along bridges over rivers. Japan really is a beautiful place.

Probably the only downside of the riding was that it fell on the days that it did, as it was during the time of the Bon festival - allow me to quote Wikipedia:

"Obon or just Bon is a Japanese Buddhist custom to honor the departed (deceased) spirits of one's ancestors. This Buddhist custom has evolved into a family reunion holiday during which people return to ancestral family places and visit and clean their ancestors' graves, and when the spirits of ancestors are supposed to revisit the household altars. It has been celebrated in Japan for more than 500 years and traditionally includes a dance, known as Bon-Odori."

Sounds nice enough, unfortunately for bike touring it means that every road is absolutely packed with cars, every hotel and camp site is nearing capacity, and every graveyard is lined with cars taking up half the lane opening their doors unexpectedly. But without the bad how would we know the good, right? It made the few times we found a dedicated bike path all the better.

At one point in the ride, we opted to take a mountain pass rather than another long stretch of tunnel and were rewarded with the sight of some monkeys crossing our path. I only managed to get the camera out in time to catch this one - who I can only assume was trying to determine if I was food or not.

The fun of seeing monkeys and reaching the top of the pass was quickly forgotten as we discovered that the road down the other side was actually closed, or something. We can't actually read most of these signs but I think they're pretty self explanatory.

So while Zack went ahead to check it out on foot, I spoke with a Japanese man who had pulled up in a car behind us. He explained (I think!) that there was a rock slide the previous year that had damaged parts of the road, and so it was closed for repairs.

I asked him if biking it would be ok, and he just shrugged, which was good enough for us. We proceeded slowly and made our way down the mountain. Other than some constuction materials here and there, we were happy to find that it was actually completely safe, and having the road to ourselves was a nice change of pace.

We continued on and made our way to a campsite a small distance outside of Matsumoto. We somehow managed to again find ourselves in the middle of a festival - all we knew was that there was going to be a fireworks display of some kind. Our tent however was set up for convenience and not fireworks viewing so while we initially planned to not make too much of an effort to watch them, we were invited by a fellow english speaker to join him and his group of friends at their camp site right on the lake.

We stumbled around in the dark until we found their camp site, and while most of them floated out onto the lake in a rubber boat to watch, Zack and I opted to stay dry (for once) and watched from the shore while speaking with a Japanese man named Kazu - a cancer researcher who smoked a pipe, which I found a little confusing.

We ended up being really glad we had taken them up on their offer as the fireworks were easily the best we've seen. The campsite was at the bottom of the mountain we had come down and was mostly surrounded by other mountains, allowing the noise from the fireworks to echo far into the distance. Each explosion was so loud that no matter how you tried to prepare yourself it would still startle you, and then you could listen to it echo endlessly through the hills.

On top of that they had a speedboat that was setting off water fireworks, which were (oddly enough) fireworks that they would set off right on the surface of the water, which allowed you to see the fireworks themselves, and their reflection in the water as it rippled away from the explosion.

As the fireworks finished, Kazu's friends came back to shore and we talked and ate for a couple of hours before Zack and I headed to sleep. It was a fun night, and definitely more interesting than our typical nights of camping which usually consist of one of us saying,

"What time is it?"

"Uhh.. Only 7:40"

"Why is it so dark?"

"Where's the bug spray?"

"Oh forget it, it's raining, I'm just going to go to sleep."

So after all that we're now in Matsumoto. As usual this has taken way longer than I thought it would, it's late and we're a twenty minute ride from our beds so I'm going to do this last part in record time.

We saw a castle, some samurai frogs (cue chrono trigger nostalgia), Japan is too small for Zack, the internal organs were good, Zack won an octopus, and this Internet cafe is really comfortable.

Before I go, we love reading your comments! If there's anything you would like to hear more about, or anything you find especially interesting... feel free to comment!

Oh, that typhoon

2010-08-15T23:39:00.003-04:00

Well, after a rainy couple of days - really, three days of rain sandwiched in to a 24-hour period - we've left the coast and climbed up through the mountains and arrived in Matsumoto. Map:

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Quick update really, more later once we're settled in.

Typhoon? What?

2010-08-12T08:32:00.011-04:00

Today we took a regularily scheduled rest day in the city of Niigata. As luck would have it, some kind of tropical storm is passing over to the north of us, (heading towards Hokkaido of course...worst weather ever) and thus we get to wait out its dregs in relative comfort. I planned it this way, naturally. Map:

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If anyone out there enjoys google maps as much as I do (unlikely) I try to mark our camping spots as exactly as I can, so zoom in there and see if you can see any tents! Also, that mess of blips around D was us killing time a day before we could get in to our hotel.

The riding for the past few days has been generally good, if brutally hot. One would think that when the sun sets, and the temperature drops from 36 to 27 degrees, it would be a relief. One would be wrong.

In any case, here are some features of the trip thus far that I don't think I've got to yet:

-A standard convenience store meal. Yogurt to keep the intestinal flora diverse, cold buckwheat soba noodles (good on a hot day), donuts for dessert and a nice cold bottle of chilled green tea! No sugar or anything, a nice drink.

-Huge manga libraries! Pretty much every hostel we've visited, as well as many ramen shops, have boasted enormous collections of manga. I'd probably pay 30$ a night in Canada to be able to hang out at a house and read that many comics for hours on end..

-Coffee in a can. Ice cold and packed with sugar, makes it very drinkable. From vending machines of course.

-Pudding in a can! The texture was absolutely dreadful, like drinking curdled milk, but it tasted great. Also available from vending machines.

-Individually wrapped slices of French Toast! For that heavily bastardized taste of home.

-Choco-bannana! This thing was actually pretty gross, moreso when I realized there was no real bannana inside. Though I do appreciate that only one side is coated in chocolate, saving your fingers from getting all melty-chocolatey.

And I suppose since most of these pictures have been of packaging, here are a a couple from outside:

-Riding thru the rice fields, and

-Along the riverside here in Niigata.

Tomorrow, onwards once again, towards Matsumoto and Kyoto!

Could Be Worse!

2010-08-06T21:08:00.009-04:00

As Zack would tell it, we're still "stuck" in Akita, but really there could be worse places to be stuck. Our arrival on August 3rd coincided with the start of the Kanto festival which takes place every August in Akita.

It's been happening every year for somewhere in the area of 300 years, and has become quite popular. As a result the city is completely full of people, so much so that we were forced to stay in a place that was quite a bit over our normal budget for two nights because literally every hotel and hostel was completely full.

It's hard to really explain what's going on, and getting a good picture can be tough due to the massive crowds of people, but basically after lighting paper lanterns and setting them afloat down the river that runs through town, groups of performers light and hoist up these lanterns.

It's actually pretty impressive, and looking down the steet a few kilometers in the distance to see hundreds of them marching along to the constant beat of taiko drums and wood flute melodies is quite amazing. Even moreso when you realize that each one weighs about 50kg and is usually being balanced on one hand, or the head of one person. It's also about 50 million degrees and extremely humid.

Other than the fesitval, Akita has a few small tourist attractions that we figured we would check out while we had the time.

Ok, just one tourist attraction - and that's it up there. Since we had only used up an hour we decided to go see The Last Airbender, in Japanese. It was pretty dreadful, I think I'm actually glad I couldn't hear the english dialogue.

We spent the rest of our time here picking up a few supplies, and wandering the streets at night. With the festival going on there are plenty of people everywhere, often in traditional Japanese clothes so just people watching was interesting enough.

While it was a pretty fun place to rest, I think I've seen everything in Akita twice at this point, so I'm happy to get going. Here's hoping my Japanese hasn't completely failed me, and I actually did order the correct part for the bike. I guess we'll find out this afternoon!

Our next major stop is Kyoto, which is a place I've personally always wanted to see. Hopefully the nice weather we've had while being here in Akita holds up once we get back on the bikes!

Stuck in Akita

2010-08-04T18:38:00.002-04:00

Well, we've begun our trip south down Honshu, and things aren't going particularily smoothly.

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Starting at Cape Oma, we were treated with a day of rain and fog, which necessitated a change in routes. I had originally intended to take us to the interior of the Shimokita Peninsula thru a mountainous, relatively uninhabited valley, but mountainous scenery doesn't quite seem worth it when everything is obscured by clouds!

So, we elected to take a second ferry, saving us several days of travel, and strike for the west coast where we would hopefully be able to run south away from the constant bad weather.

Conditions remained mostly the same, with low clouds during the day and rain at night. However, once we were past the worst of it, Matt's front rack broke!

So, we're now holed up in Akita (known for its attractive women, at least!) waiting for a replacement to arrive at an otherwise surprisingly well stocked bike shop. Thus is the state of the union!

We're here until Saturday, it looks like, after which point we will once again head south. The rough plan is to head inland towards the castle town of Matsumoto, over the Japan Alps, and then in to Kyoto.

So Long Seicomart

2010-07-29T07:48:00.007-04:00

Tonight is our last night in Hakodate, which means that it's also our last night on Hokkaido. It's been an interesting month full of sweet bean buns, interesting people and of course - rain.

First a special thanks to Zack for getting us from Sapporo to Hakodate with everything else in between without ever getting lost or even really inconvenienced in any way. While I'm still not one for planning things, I suppose it can be useful at times.

We've been in Hakodate for a couple of nights and while there's not too much going on here it is definitely a pleasant place to wander around. The morning fish market along the water front was a great place to find food, which in our case was yet another giant bowl of ramen topped with incredibly fresh grilled squid.

Wow, my tan is horrible. It looks like I'm wearing latex gloves. My sock tan is even worse and I can't even really do anything about it. I tried biking for a day with my sleeves rolled up and that just resulted in sun burned shoulders. Zack claims that such a tan is a bike tourist's badge of honor, which is certainly believable as it would fit in perfectly with the rest of cycling fashion - look ridiculous at all times.

Anyways, after picking up some spare parts for the bikes I spent a few hours wandering around the city. The downtown area of Hakodate is quite nice, the old fishing warehouses having been converted into touristy shops and restaurants. Nothing too surprising, but a nice way to spend the afternoon.

I met up with Zack for dinner to preemptively celebrate my birthday. Lured by something even better than Otaru's 1 litre beers - 1.8 litre beers - we spent some time at Hakodate's micro brewery. The 1.8 litre beers ended up just being normal pitchers, which was a little disappointing but we managed somehow.

After dinner we aimlessly wandered around the area until we happened across an unassuming handwritten sign for an upstairs bar that looked inviting enough. Inside we found ourselves in a tiny, dimly lit, but very comfortable looking space with only the bartender behind the bar and a couple quietly talking in the corner.

We decided to sit at the bar and continued our celebrations for a couple of hours while talking with the bartender and the owner who appeared at some point. While talking we were offered a free pizza which we happily accepted, and while that was generous enough already, as the evening was coming to an end the conversation turned to the mountain that looms over Hakodate, at which point the owner offered to drive us up to see the view from the top - another offer we couldn't refuse.

So, somehow without ever even exchanging names we found ourselves at the top of Hakodateyama overlooking an incredible night time view of the city with our two new friends. Truly worth seeing if you ever find yourself in Japan. While we did take pictures, they really wouldn't do it justice.

We left the mountain top as the fog started to roll in and twisted our way back down the road that snakes up the side of the mountain. We did our best to express our gratitude as we said our goodbyes and headed back to the hostel for the night.

It was a part of Hakodate we would have never seen had it not been for the kindness and generosity of these two strangers for which we are more grateful than I feel we were able to adequately express through Japanese, and so even though they'll never read this, thank you!

If you're ever in Hakodate, spend some time tracking the place down and relay our best wishes.

With that, I'm off to sleep. The next update will likely be from somewhere in northern Honshu, but not for a few days at least. Hard to believe it's already been a month.

Hokkaido, home of the world's worst cycling weather

2010-07-27T07:29:00.007-04:00

At a time when apparently the entire Northern hemisphere is complaining about how abnormally hot and sunny it is, here in Hokkaido we're having a different experience. I have, in fact, determined what the worst possible weather conditions for cycling are - here they are in point form:
-First, there must be a headwind. As I've stated, the only noticeable tailwind we've experienced in a full month cycling all the way around Hokkaido lasted one morning.
-Second, it needs to be cloudy. Cloudy enough to obscure the clear blue sky, and certainly cloudy enough to hide any nearby beautiful mountain peaks that might make the ride memorable.
-Third, and this is what makes it so nefarious - the sun must come out for at least two hours. The sky does not clear, mind you, but rather the sun burns a hole in the clouds above you for just long enough to make your pass ascent murderously hot, and enough for a greasy sunscreen application to be necessary to avoid a burn.

Today, on our last day of riding on Hokkaido, we fittingly experienced this day a (hopefully) final time. Bonus: Packing the tent after a full night of rain, and arriving in Hakodate in yet another downpour!

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Overtly negative tone aside, we're actually doing fine. We even had one pleasant day of riding to show for the past 4 - a ride over the shoulder of Mt. Yotei:

as well as a very scenic ride around Lake Toya, with a lakeside camping spot to boot:

We're once again huddled in a hostel, wondering where to go next. The view from our room:

I'm not sure exactly how long we'll be here - a few days at least - nor do I know exactly where we're headed next. Somewhere south. Once the rain stops. (Sometime in the next week, please?)

Otaru

2010-07-23T05:09:00.010-04:00

Well here we are in Otaru, with our ever present friends rain and fog.

Despite the weather, we've been enjoying ourselves here. It's easily the most lively town we've been in since we started in Sapporo. Otaru is inexplicably famous for it's glass blowing studios which we only really experienced in passing, and by proxy of the 463 thousand souvenir shops selling various glass things that wouldn't last more than a day squashed into our bike bags.

The sushi here was also highly recommended, and while it was quite fresh and definitely a nice change from the Seicomart meals, it has the price tag to match. Somehow it bothers me to pay more for raw fish from an ocean that's ten feet away, than I do for raw fish that was frozen and shipped half way across the world in Toronto, but what can ya do.

We then wandered into an tiny ice cream/t-shirt store in search of beer flavoured ice cream but found something even better; crab flavoured ice cream, and to answer your question - it tastes like crab. We also tried wasabi, potato and pumpkin. All of which were actually pretty good.

We finished off the night in the micro brewery and after having a pint of everything on their menu couldn't resist the ridiculously over sized one litre glasses of beer that look like something out of the Flintstones.

And just when we thought the one litre glasses were the highlight of the night, we came across a place selling Bakudan which I don't even know how to explain. It's a ball of fishy tasting goo that you can put different toppings on? Even after eating one I'm not even sure what it was, I don't think I want to find out either. I have a feeling it's the seafood equivalent of a hot dog - miscellaneous parts crushed into a tasty paste.

Anyways, the Bakudan wasn't even the best part, it was the 30 second Bakudan theme song that played literally non-stop over and over from the shop that I'm sure is haunting the dreams of the poor girl forced to listen to it for hours a day. We only heard it for five minutes and can't get it out of our heads. I'll come back and edit this if I can find it on Youtube.

Tonight in Otaru there's a festival of some sort, lasting the whole weekend. Fireworks, music, lots of glass stuff for sale along the old railroad.

Unfortunately, it's pouring rain and doesn't seem to be letting up, so we will likely skip the festivities so we can get an early start tomorrow. Our next major destination is Hakodate, our last stop on the island of Hokkaido and also an opportunity to celebrate my birthday on the 30th. I'll be turning the horrifying age of 29. Leaving me only one more year before I have to start lying about my age, or be forced to act like a grown up - I think we all know which is more likely.

All things said and done, Otaru was a nice city to spend a few days off the bikes. Tomorrow morning it's back to Seicomart, rain and headwinds! Which actually seems strangely appealing right now.

Small update - The rain eventually did clear, and so we made our way to the festival at night. It was surprisingly busy, something like the CNE in Toronto, with fireworks and even a not so fantastic Japanese metal band hitting the stage.

We came here for the beer

2010-07-21T03:33:00.007-04:00

After a fairly productive 5 days of riding, we've reached the town of Otaru:

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which we selected as a destination based on hearing that it has a fairly good microbrewery. Also because we really haven't been to a city since our arrival.

Some highlights from along the way:

-A beautiful (good weather!) ride around Lake Mashu (pictured), Mt. Ioh and Lake Kusharo. This was a un-laden ride we did on a rest day in Teshikaga, a 60km loop which also featured an outdoor onsen which was FAR too hot to actually sit in.

-A day of actual nice riding weather. Although I'm fairly sure it had headwinds. The wind blows from whatever direction you're travelling in, in Hokkaido. This is a fact. We've traveled every compass direction now and with the exception of the one morning I alluded to earlier, it is the truth. It will even change during the day as you do.

-A morning ride along the shore of Lake Shikotsu. This was of course followed by two grueling ascents as well as a flirtation with Sapporo traffic. Rather than tackle it head on, I opted to force Matt up a third climb in order to avoid it.

I believe the highest pass thus far we've done is Nissho pass, which was 1022m above sea level. Not bad! (A google search for Nissho pass, at least from google.co.jp, finds a youtube video with the caption "Nissho pass is terrible road...") It would have been fine, really, if not for the literally howling headwind we faced both going up and down the mountain. This was the sort of headwind that's usually only exaggerated about when boasting of passes climbed long ago...let it be said, we have now done a climb in a 50km/h headwind.

So, we're here in Otaru planning to take a day or so off, before heading south for the final push to Hakodate. We're a few days ahead of "schedule" by which I mean my arbitrary plan of spending precisely 1 month in Hokkaido. Thus, rest days will be frequent and mileages short. Until next time,

-z

In which the weather gods were cursed

2010-07-16T02:56:00.008-04:00

Before I start, we've posted 3 entries now in as many days, so if you haven't checked back in a while, look down the page to see if you've missed any.

Where I last left off, we'd woken to a driving rain in the town of Abashiri. Our Korean friend Hyun, who we'd met the night before, poked his head out of his tent and told us curtly "I'm not riding anywhere today."
We set out anyway, and to give the abridged version, experienced 3 days of crappy weather and bad lodgings. So, rather than write it out, here's a brief photo essay.

-Riding up the Okhotsk coast of the Shiretoko peninsula. A famous world heritage area, the most remote area in Japan, and boasting a healthy asian brown bear population (which rules the park with an iron fist - if a bear is sighted nearby, the area is closed off). All we saw were bad roads, headwinds, and what may have been been a mountain (obscured by fog of course).

-Skipping over the overpriced dingy hostel, this was the ride up over Shiretoko pass. A 15km ascent, supposedly boasting fantastic views. We saw a couple of foxes on the way up, but hit the clouds soon after. It was actually pretty neat - howling winds and swirling mists, temperatures dropping below 10 celsius, an epic climb indeed. However we saw no scenery.

-We emerged from the clouds on the other side of the pass, in to the town of Rausu and surprisingly good weather! (This would last in to the evening but no later.) The most exciting thing? Getting a clear view of the Russian-controlled island of Kunashir! For some reason, seeing Russia was big on my list, and with just the faintest outline of Sakhalin visible from Wakkanai, this did the trick very nicely.

-For one night at least, I could see Russia from my house (tent). Blah blah, Sarah Palin joke, ......

-After another boring, cloudy day of riding in to the wind, we reached the spa town of Teshikaga, where we're staying even still. Surely the weather would get better, right?

-And finally, ramen with our Finnish pal Mikka!

Tomorrow we head west, probably towards the city of Otaru which will likely be our next stop. I imagine after 3 days of sunshine, sweat and sunburns, I'll be crying for the rain again, but the complaining is what makes it fun!

-z

Of Rice and Ramen

2010-07-15T01:55:00.014-04:00

Can noodles be beautiful?

I don't think I'd care to live in a world where they couldn't. So while Zack's been busy with maps and "planning" things - whatever that means, I've been documenting something of much greater importance; our food.

Pictured above is what has become one of our most frequent meals. Unlike the boring spaghetti noodle, ramen noodles twist and turn haphazardly through a murky bowl of soup, the flavour of which is usually written in Kanji, the one Japanese script that we can't reliably read and so is usually a surprise.

Twisting around each other into a loosely knit rope of noodles they lie waiting to be dredged up from the bottom of the bowl with our steadily increasing chopstick skill, the temporary pockets formed in the noodle-rope hold just enough of the soup to make each bite full of flavour.

On top of the pile often lies a slab or two of meat, fish or a raw egg - again depending on which picture in the menu we gesture at, and again usually a surprise - so far never a disappointment.

The prices are about what you would see for a meal in Toronto, thought the portions are much larger. It's hard to tell the size from the pictures, but the bowls are massive. It's an ideal meal after a few hours of cycling and on the cold, rainy, foggy days the thought of a giant hot bowl of delicious calories is enough to keep you going. That and dry clothes - I don't know if we aren't operating the dryers properly or what, but every place we've stopped I swear the "dryers" are just spraying our clothes with hot water. Often after spending 400 yen on one load of clothes we just give up. They were inevitably going to get wet again anyways.

There's also plenty of sushi to be found and it's as good as you would expect. The wasabi particularly seems to be much better here, almost buttery.

However, this being a bike trip we are on a modest budget and since most places we ride through either don't have restaurants, or the ones they do have are open at odd hours it's not all delicious ramen and sushi. Especially breakfast which is usually these terrible oats we bought that I'm pretty sure were supposed to be for horses.

Enter Seicomart - the Japanese equivalent of 7/11 (although they have those too) - somewhere around 40% of our meals are made up of prepared foods you can get off the shelves that we warm up in the microwave, and usually eat sitting on the curb outside the store.

There are many different kinds, some better than others but they are all actually pretty good. Seicomart meals, with a sweet bean bun and a yogurt has been our staple food for through small towns where we can't find a real restaurant or don't have enough time to stop.

Then somewhere at the bottom of the line is the road stop food. Don't get me wrong, it's all very tasty, but it's so obviously unhealthy... it's basically battered, deep fried fat. Being able to eat stuff like this and not worry about it has been one of the best parts of bike touring.

Other than all the above we've had a few amazing meals at some of the hostels we've stayed at that we don't have pictures of - an indoor seafood barbecue, some raw horse meat, basically an entire deer at one point - everything has been fantastic even though we often don't even know what we're eating.

The final thing that has to be mentioned is the drinks. You practically cannot go more than 10km in any moderately populated area in Japan without running into something like this.

Just about anything you could ask for. Juice, water, coffee, tea - it's all there. We've probably spent $25 each so far just on vending machine drinks because it's so incredibly convenient. There's even sometimes a selection of hot drinks, for those cold mornings.

So, for those of you asking about the food, that's how it's been so far. We're pretty much over our fear of looking like tourists, especially since with Zack towering over everyone and having to crawl through every doorway it's pretty much impossible to blend in - so we'll be sure to keep taking pictures of anything interesting that we decide to eat. I'm sure there'll be plenty.

There's a lot more to talk about but I've been using the only computer in this place for far too long now. We're at this hostel for another two nights, so I'm sure boredom will kick in again and we'll write something else.

For now, here's a picture of a dog. His owner's were even kind enough to label him for your convenience. And no, we didn't eat the dog.

The Okh-coast with the Most

2010-07-14T05:57:00.007-04:00

....rain, that is.

Sorry, that pun's been floating in my head for about 400km now, and if you didn't like it you're free to read some other self-indulgent traveller's blog!

The current state of affairs is we're settling in to a hostel near the town of Teshikaga, waiting for the bad weather to stop, so there will likely be a flurry of posts in the next couple of days!

Anyway, in order for my pun to even make sense, the story is that since leaving Wakkanai a week ago, and travelling down the coast of the Okhotsk sea (get it now??!?), it's been at least cloudy and often rainy. For the full week. Here's another block of text that's been ruminating for the past few days; it's entitled
"Things we have yet to experience in Japan"
-An enjoyable morning of camping complete with a dry tent
-A view of a mountain peak, unobscured by cloud
-The "non-rainy season" of Hokkaido
-A tailwind
-A starry night sky

Less complaining and more pictures, right? In Wakkanai we met a fellow cyclist by the name of Yoneda Kiyoji, who took us out for dinner and even treated us! He also allowed me to practice a little Japanese which I would imagine was trying for him.

We set out, rounded Cape Soya, which is the northernmost point in Japan, and didn't really bother taking any pictures since we arrived in concert with every tour bus north of the 40th parallel. Down the cloudy coast, we actually found a pretty decent free campsite overlooking the sea.

There we met another cyclist, Takahashi Yuichi, who we rode with for the day. We stopped early in the town of Okoppe, to take advantage of the free lodgings (pictured below, an old train car) and to avoid the rain. Yuichi read the menus for us at a few restaurants, which was awesome, and also took us to a Sento to get cleaned up. A Sento is, of course, much like an Onsen, except without the pretense of thermally heated water (but all of the nudity).

We bid adieu to Yuichi and headed south along the coast. We actually managed a good day of riding (I lied before, we had a tailwind that morning) and aided by another fantastic cycling road, made it to the town of Abashiri. At the free campsite there, we met another two cyclists (one from Osaka, one from Korea), had a pleasant evening, and then of course woke up to pouring rain the next morning.

I'll stop there and leave some for Matt to complain about, but before I forget, THE MAP! (The green marks are where we stopped for the night, with G being our present location.)

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We may also set up some sort of a photo album somewhere since it's too annoying posting them all on blogger. More to come,

-z

The Tubes are Clogged!

2010-07-13T02:55:00.002-04:00

We're currently in Rausu in a tiny coffee shop/Internet cafe, and not entirely sure what else to do with ourselves. We came over a 700 meter mountain pass this morning so feel that we've earned some time off the bikes!

Unfortunately we can't post pictures from here, and as we're currently using the only two computers in a room full of people I feel pressured to make this quick...

Next time we settle in somewhere with free Internet we'll make up for it, until then.. this short post will have to do just so you know we're still alive.

Oh and Jason, we've been taking pictures of all our food just for you.

Rest for the Wicked

2010-07-07T21:28:00.009-04:00

It's been a grueling 3 days on the road and we've once again found ourselves comfortably ensconced in a fully-equipped hostel. This time we'll actually be taking a rest day, that is, a day off the bike - so that I might allow my sunburn to heal, and Matt, his various bike-seat related aches and chafy spots.

Firstly, the map:

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from Furano to Rumoi to Teshio and finally to Wakkanai, Japan's most northerly city.

We set out from Furano on a rather sunny morning (hence the sunburn) which somehow still managed to be cloudy enough to obscure our views of the surrounding mountains. (This would be a theme)

One fixture of touring we've found very pleasant is the abundance of "Michi-no-Eki" or Road Stations, which boast restaurants, dozens of vending machines, clean washrooms, souvenir shops and sometimes even computerized maps that report on road conditions in the area. Ideal when you're parched, starving, dirty and need to use the washroom, which is pretty much always the case, for me at least.

Later that afternoon, we hit the town of Rumoi on the Sea of Japan! Reaching the sea is always exciting, even if you've only really traveled 100k or so to get there. We trucked up the coast a little further and found a superb campsite on a bluff overlooking the sea.

A little morning rain forced us to pack the tent away wet. We then continued up the coast under overcast skies and facing a constant headwind. Passing the town of Teshio at dinner-time, we entered the Sarobetsu National Park, which is supposedly a vast expanse of wild, undeveloped wetland. In reality it was a vast expanse of hayfields, wind turbines and more headwinds. We did find a sweet camping spot however - whereas the night before we were lulled to sleep by the sound of the surf below, this time the white noise of the constantly humming turbines did it. (Note to those NIMBY anti-wind power people - you have to be really close to hear it and it's not even that bad!)

The one regret about riding up the coast here is that it was cloudy the whole time, thus obscuring our view of Rishiri Island, which is a 1700m volcano that juts out of the Sea of Japan. If it clears up this afternoon we may still see it, but it doesn't look good!

And finally, we've reached Wakkanai! I imagine Matt will upload some more pictures tonight, so I will now take this opportunity to blab about bike-touring related stuff:
-The roads here have been great, for the most part well paved with huge shoulders, even in the bigger towns. Note to Toronto City Councillors - forget about bike lanes. Just paint lines and create shoulders on every street. Problem solved!
-Drivers have been very courteous about giving us plenty of space
-For some reason - and I'm not exaggerating even slightly here - the sun rises at 3:30am. This is great for getting an early start to the day - we're often on the road by 7:30 - but not so great when 10am rolls around and you're eager for second breakfast, and nothing opens until 11:30. The other result is that it gets dark at 8, so you stop riding at 6 and tend to go to bed by 7:30. Lame, I know.

It's a bit chilly here in Wakkanai. That plus the fact that there's a ferry route connecting the town to the Russian city of Korsakov, which results in a lot of Cyrillic signage around town, a very weird, not-so-Japanese atmosphere dominates. We're going to shamble in to town to try and find a restaurant where they think we can handle seafood (usually we just get pork when we randomly gesture at the menus) and then set out South towards the Shiretoko peninsula tomorrow. Until then,

!

-Also, for Zak: Yes, that is the North Face tent, yes, it's still a little too small for 2, no, nothing will ever smell as bad as your sleeping bag did, and as for chamois cream? I don't know, will have to look up the kanji!

Mountains? What mountains?

2010-07-04T02:50:00.007-04:00

So, as it happens, we're apparently spending all our time in hostels with ample internet access.

Lured by the prospect of a "Dutch Oven" chicken feast, and encouraged by our first night of actual sleep in days (I honestly haven't really slept even close to a full night since leaving Toronto) we elected to stay an extra night in Furano and explore what it has to offer.

Firstly, for the cartologically inclined, our route of the past two days:

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Accurate, even including the Sapporo cycling road!

Anyway, today on our "day off" we decided on the advice of one of the hostel guys to ride our bikes up to Tokachidake Onsen which is about halfway up a nearby volcano.

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Plug that in to Bikely or something if you like - this was probably one of the steeper climbs I've ever encountered.

It started out simply enough, with a flat ride on a country road through fields of rice, wheat, and lavender flowers - Furano is apparently described as the "South of France of Japan" whatever that means, I've never been to France but the countryside was certainly pleasant.

Once we turned up the mountain however, it got a little tougher, as it was uphill for probably a full 18km. Granted, still through completely beautiful farmlands and forests.

The forests here are incredible - you're presented with walls of greenery on either side of the road, almost completely impenatrable. Strange, almost tropical birdcalls are a constant, and wildlife seems to be everywhere - we saw two foxes on the way up, one of which I needed to yell at repeatedly before he would screw off. (Cute little fellow, but sorry, I don't really feel like having to get a rabies shot here)

The top of the climb was just ridiculous - with grades going up to 14% - and it started pouring to top it off. However, we did indeed reach the Onsen (volcanic hot spring) at the top.

Onsens are fantastic - picture a steaming hot bath fed by geothermically heated water, with a view of the valley below. Great, right? All we had to do to experience it (aside from the gruelling hill climb) was decipher the etiquette behind using one, which involved conquering a fear of ubiquitous male nudity. A helpful primer: here
Sorry, no photographs of naked dudes :(

Tomorrow we set out again, striking North and West, aiming for the town of Rumoi on the coast of the Sea of Japan. Will we stop for three days at a hostel because we're tired and dirty? Probably! Until then, the roasted chicken awaits...

I Dislike Mountains!

2010-07-03T02:36:00.013-04:00

So we've left Sapporo. I can probably sum it up in one picture.

Possibly a bit of an exaggeration, but it seems Zack has already filled you in on what we've managed to accomplish so far. Yesterday morning the relaxing was finished and we headed off from the hostel.

Our initial worries of riding out of the city, on the wrong side of the road on three hours of sleep were immediately quashed by the availability of a bike only street that took us practically right from the hostel's front door, all the way out of Sapporo.

Just when we thought it couldn't get any better, the scenery changed, and now not only were we riding through a major city on our own private street, but through a shady forest.

Everywhere we've been in Japan so far it has been easy to accomplish whatever we needed to. The roads are amazing, there are vending machines on every corner, the ATMs talk to you.. even the trucks talk to you when they're making wide turns. We continued on the forest road until we reached another wonderful innovation, a biking station. Why they don't have these in every country is beyond me. Washrooms, water, bike rentals - whatever you needed.

Once we were off the bike path and out of the city, we made our way 50k or so along the highway before finding a decent spot out of sight of the highway to set up camp. There were about 50 to 60 million mosquitos. I tried bug spray, yelling at them, and various combinations of the two - none were effective.

We packed up in the morning after another mostly sleepless night thanks to some ridiculously loud frogs as well as a general lack of comfort and headed out from there.

This is where we ran into the mountains. At first it was not too bad, but as we continued on turn after turn there would be another climb ahead, silently mocking me. The only saving grace was the tunnels that were generally about 15 degrees cooler than the outside, and there were some long stretches of downhill.

The mountains may have been more managable if we had food to eat or water to drink, but for a stretch of about 80km there was nothing. Zack, the experienced biker never once complained about my slowness! But he took this picture to ensure that I was aware of it.

Even though it was a tough ride, the scenery was fantastic, and everyone has been really good to us, giving us thumbs up and yelling "Gambatte!" as they drive by. The bridges can be a bit startling at times, with nothing but a three foot railing keeping you from a 100 foot fall.

In the end it all worked out, we made it to Furano, drank three bottles of water and found a hostel just before the thunderstorm rolled in. We'll stay the night and set off somewhere else tomorrow. I really have no idea where, for all I know we're going around in circles. I just assume that when Zack spends 15 minutes looking at the map that he knows what he's doing.

Leaving Sapporo

2010-07-01T21:23:00.013-04:00

Well, we have survived our stay in Sapporo and are finally going to set out and actually use these bicycles we went to so much trouble to lug here.
Some highlights:

Susukino at night - think John and Richmond

100 minutes of all-you-can-drink at the Sapporo Brewery Beer Garden

Meeting with KUMA-SAN

I forget what this was a picture of, but I'm going to assume that Atsuko is laughing at Matt's Japanese.

Realizing a lifelong dream of karaoke-ing Endless Rain with an actual Japanese person!

and finally, thanks to the rest of our Karaoke Crew - Trina and Kento - for preventing us from leaving the hostel before 11am!

It has been a fun couple of days, but we are both excited to do some actual bike riding. As I would say in my horrible broken Japanese, IKIMASHOU!
And one final victory, I've managed to find the apostrophe key! Shift-7 should anyone ever find themselves in such an un-enviable bind.

Arrival in Sapporo

2010-06-29T22:11:00.021-04:00

Well, we made it. I will spare you the details of a perfectly unremarkable airplane journey (and also speak like Data because I cannot find the apostrophe on this keyboard) but the important thing is, we made it in one piece, and are now clean, happy and in possession of two functional, non-broken bicycles.

Getting from the airport to the hostel was an adventure in public transport (awesome subway pictured) and after a little nighttime wandering of the streets of Sapporo we found our hostel.

We are here for two more days - setting up and checking the place out. After that, we have not really figured out where exactly we plan to go, but expect too see it mapped out in detail via google maps!

2 days...

2010-06-26T19:43:00.005-04:00

The bags are packed, and we're ready to go. Actually, *I* am ready to go - knowing Matt he'll finish his packing at 9am on Monday morning. And then probably show up late for the flight out.

Barring any G20-related delays, we fly at 1pm on Monday afternoon, and arrive in Sapporo Tuesday at about 9pm. From there, we trek from the airport to our hostel in downtown Sapporo via the following meticulously planned route:

View Larger Map

Fun with google maps - zoom in and you can follow the transfers from train to subway to street. You can actually see where we're staying in street view!

Beyond that, the open road awaits! Wish us luck....

10 Days

2010-06-18T13:43:00.008-04:00

In case it wasn't obvious, we're going to Japan. Zack, once fully spandexed is going to lead the way while I am going to fuel our progress with sarcasm and hill related cursing.

We're there for 88 days and attempting to cover roughly 4,000km. As is our nature, nothing is thoroughly planned. Below is the first month or so of biking and while we likely wont stick to the plan exactly, it's a rough indication of our goals.

View Larger Map

If television has taught me anything about Japan it's that we'll be in a constant state of battle with giant wasps, tentacle monsters and evil samurai but I'm pretty sure everyone knows Karate so we should be ok.

We leave in ten days and today is my last day of work, so I'm off to enjoy a few days of the Canadian patio season as an unemployed drifter before we leave!