Fukuoka – Shimonoseki 75 miles Leaving central Fukuoka, was slow and tedious. Traffic lights, busy three lane highways, clustered and bumpy sidewalks and of course a cutthroat contingent of guileless mamachari. The weather was overcast, yet extremely humid, the vast throngs of heavy traffic and exhaust fumes only adding fuel to the surrounding stickiness. Eventually,…
Tag: Japanese History
Okinawa : History & Beer
Naha 66 Miles My hostel in Naha was run down and grubby, carrying with it the feel of a random backpacker’s hostel plucked straight out of the back streets of somewhere in South East Asia. In fact, the city itself had a very different vibe to the Japanese mainland. Being one of the country’s poorest…
The Split Rim of Hiroshima
Onomichi – Hiroshima 65 miles The day was uncomfortably muggy as I took the coastal road west to Hiroshima. The roads heavily congested bore me a number of issues. Punctures today came like buses, I received two simultaneously. I would also notice that the rear tyre had some wobble to it. Finding an inch of…
The Kingdom of the Peach Boy
Okayama – Naoshima 47 miles The morning started slow; my solitary rear mud guard and brakes annoyingly chaffed my rear tyre as I headed west, out of Okayama. Love diminished fast for mud guards on this trip, yes they repelled a certain amount of water and random street guff, but at the same time when…
Here comes a new challenger…
17. Toyama Takayama – Toyama 64 miles The ride north to Toyama City saw me leave the Japanese Alps behind; it had been an intense week and I had been feeling a longing for the coast again. Toyama means ‘many mountains’ and it would certainly live up to its name; a riotous cluster of alpine…
Robot Touching in Exile
Sado Island 77 miles An evening boat would take me to Sado, some 30 miles west off the coast of Niigata. I’d arrived in darkness and quickly found myself an unkempt stretch of coastal parkland to set up camp. Sado is a place with a morose history, and that’s even before you consider the slave…
Hokkaido Summer: Farewell to the North
Oshamanbe – Hakodate 87 miles When I slept, I dreamed of Pokémon, most notably an unofficial Pokémon that goes by the name of ‘Anusmouthmon,’ and the less said about his party trick the better! His ethereal-realm antics however wouldn’t put me off my breakfast of chocolate croissants from the ever trusting Seicomart; a supermarket that…
Tokyo to Tokyo 