AndreasOutside

A home cooked breakfast and driving tour of the neighborhood got us started on our route to Kagoshima. Our coastal route was surprisingly limited with ocean views due to tsunami barriers and transportation infrastructure along the shoreline. When a view appeared, it was incredible. The daily riding was taking a toll on our bodies and…

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From Usuki we headed inland to make our way south to Yumiko’s house in Kadogawa. The route took us repeatedly up terraced valleys, over forested passes and then down through terrased valleys, repeatedly. Rice fields were everywhere in different states of readiness for harvest. Scarecrows in one town outnumbered inhabitants. The descent in Kadogawa was…

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A lazy morning in Ozu after a late evening pizza party with English language learners we made our way to Yawatahama port and caught our ferry to Kyushu. We arrived at sunset and are now safe and comfortable in a traditional Japanese Inn, ready to sleep on tatami mats for the night.

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What these pictures fail to capture is an intense thunder and lightning storm just before the 950 m highpoint of our ride. The weather changed soon after we started our descent; a 45 km drop completed in just over 2 hours.

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We slept in and ended up visiting the Kochi Castle along with a cruise ship that had just docked in port. We made the best of it and then moved on beyond Susaki to a wild camp by the river. The coastline road was splendid in the late afternoon light.

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After leaving camp we headed to a popular vine bridge destination over the Iya River with incredible views of the valley at every turn. We dealt with some broken spokes and then made our way to Kochi along the Yoshino River followed by the Ananai River watching kayakers run rapids as we climbed beside them…

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We are in our tents ready to sleep at 8pm tonight after two days of continuous motion from Kyoto to the Iya Valley with the help of a 1am to 5am ferry crossing from Kobe to Takematsu. The valleys, canyons, and gorges are a stunning contrast to landscapes we have seen so far.

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A night at Kyoto Shima with our host Kouji was fantastic. Located near the Kyoto Tower and Kyoto Station, everything in town is easily accessible. After breakfast we rode towards Osaka along the river trails. Our day will end in Kobe at the port waiting for the ferry to Shikoku.

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South along the west coast of Lake Biwa watching the sun and temperature rise from 12 to 19 by the end of the ride. We entered Kyoto following a canal that tunnels its way into two hills on the way from Lake Biwa. When the canal disappeared, we needed to climb only seeing it again…

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The wettest day yet along with a morning climb on a washed out road. Being closed to car traffic made the climb and subsequent descent, all in a downpour, quite relaxing. George saw a monkey. The descent ended on the east shore of Lake Biwa with the sun finally making its way through to us…

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