Roving Japan

Day 59 Photoset

It rained pretty hard last night. So hard that it actually woke us up several times. We were both pretty tired this morning, so we were lucky that the rest area we were camping in had a vending machine with coffee for 80yen.

We walked pretty far today, making it all the way to Hikone. It was a nice walk, and we were very fortunate with the weather. The report called for rain all day, but we somehow managed to walk between storms and were lucky enough to miss almost all the rain. I even got a little more sun burned to add to my already potent farmers tan.

We did our best to walk off the highway as much as possible, as the constant traffic gives us both headaches. It was nice to take a mental break and walk through the rice patties, watching the crows hunting for bugs and the frogs hopping around everywhere.

There was a sad/interesting shrine along the way. At some point in history, it was a shrine in the middle of the countryside. Now it has a Shinkansen track going right through the middle of the main path.

A couple of the towns we walked through still have the Nakasendo marked. It was a nice assurance to see signs marking the old path. It reminded me of the signs in Oregon for the Oregon trail, and how Oregonians barely notice them. I am sure that the locals don’t even notice the Nakasendo markers, but they were sure a welcome sight for us!

After three days of walking in high humidity, we grabbed a hotel for the night. Tomorrow we are going to check out Hikone castle before starting through the mountains towards Gifu. I set two targets, either camp by the river in Semegai or at a shrine in Kashiwabara.

Day 24 Photoset

We are in Matsuyama! For the first time since setting foot on Shikoku, we are in a modern city. Matsuyama is famous for the Matsuyama castle and the Dogo onsen. As we walked into the city, we spotted the castle on the hill in the center of town. I couldn’t help but think that at one time it was a more impressive sight. Buildings now are so huge, the castle looked quaint, not imposing.

Today we just checked our bags at the hotel and limped around the immediate area looking at shops. There is a main covered shopping street right next to our hotel, so we spent our time in there. I think that Matsuyama has some of the worst/best engrish of any city we’ve been in so far. The main English tourist pamphlet is titled, “Sweet hearts and dreams bring you a roman.” “The Town with hot springs, the castle and literatures”. Nice eh?

Tomorrow we are going to see the castle and onsen. I also found out that there is a micro brewery near the onsen, so we plan on checking that out.

Day 10 Photoset

Today was another slow day. We left our beautiful camp in the cove near Hyuga and started north to Nobeoka.

It was fairly uneventful, with the highlights being the Totoro train station (exciting because we love the movie), and the restaurant we ate lunch in.

We are now staying in a business hotel in Nobeoka. We are planning on staying here for the night, then hopefully finding someplace cheaper to stay tomorrow. We need to spend at least a day going over our options for getting to Oita. We can either walk straight through the mountains, walk the coastline, or do a bus/walk combo around the coastline.

Stay Tuned!

Day 4 Photoset

I felt a little guilty about taking a train today. But the blister on my left foot reminded me that we had always intended to occasionally take a bus or train. We are going to spend at least 2 days in Miyazaki, then we intend to start walking up the cost towards Beppu. So the walking will continue!

However, before we start the next walking segment, we need to rest up and enjoy this new area of Kyushu. Rest comes first, so we didn’t do too much today. We checked in to a hotel (another awesome bargain discovered by Risa!), then went to the grocery store across the street where we bought a ton of really awesome food at rock bottom prices.

It’s really hot here, so we sat in the hotel room for a few hours while we waited for the sun to go down a bit. Then we left the hotel and started to explore our new city.

The first things we noticed was all the great little restaurants around our hotel. Besides the amazing grocery store, there were tons of cheap little places with delicious looking local specialties like Chicken Namban, Mehikari, and Reijiru. Our first impression is that we love Miyazaki!

After being impressed by the food selection, we walked down to the river and followed the shore for a while. The river that bisects Miyazaki is huge, and has an amazing path along the shore that includes a mini river, and large open grassy areas. The river seems to be the main place to walk your dog, or go for a run. I can’t say that I blame them. The temperature was perfect, warm but with a cool breeze. We love Miyazaki!

Our dinner tonight was at one of the local places we past by earlier. We ordered the local specialties and were not disappointed. Everything was fantastic! Did I mention that we love Miyazaki?

Tomorrow we are going to rent a car. There are several major attractions south of the city that are considered a “must see” so we are going to see them all! Oh, and I know that there are a couple of you who hear, “rent a car in Japan” and you think of THIS. But in reality, we are getting one of THESE. Sorry to disappoint!

Day 3 Photoset

The wind shifted at some point last night. We went from a pleasant breeze in the evening, to feeling like we were camping on a pig farm by 3 or 4am. The smell was terrible! We both hid in our sleeping bags until first light, then we quickly packed up and started down hwy 2 towards Miyakonojo.

The highway was pretty, and this segment was mostly downhill. In the morning we walked past a house and a lady asked what we were doing. When we told her the plan, she was really surprised and she asked for our names. She thought that maybe she would read about us in the paper. I hope she was thinking we will be in the news, and not in the obituaries.

The highlight of the day came when we spotted a 100yen coin on the sidewalk, which we later used to buy an ice cream cone. Simple pleasures.

Yesterday we were thinking that the campground might be far enough, but we decided today that we would walk all the way to downtown Miyokonojo. When we got to the neighboring city of Takarabe, we stopped for an hour or so at their tourist information building where we spent our time looking up hotels for the night. Risa has gotten very good at finding us good deals, and she did it again! We got ourselves a good deal at a business hotel.

A note about Miyakonojo. Its the biggest city with nothing to do that I have ever seen. Its the biggest city in the Miyazaki prefecture, but it didn’t even warrant high-res satellite photos on google, so that’s got to tell you something. For dinner, we walked all over a 4 block radius and couldn’t find a single ‘real’ restaurant. Everything was Izakaya’s. I know that Izakaya’s can be a lot of fun, but they are generally very expensive, and don’t give large servings. We ended up at an Izakaya and for $20 our dinner was about 6 pieces of beef and 10 pieces of chicken.

After 30km today (and about 75km total so far), I think we are going to take a rest day tomorrow and possibly the day after. Also, now that we know Miyakonojo has virtually nothing to offer, we have decided to use our rest day as a chance to just jump on the train to Miyazaki. Miyazaki is a 2 day walk, or a 1 hour train ride. We are choosing the train.

We’re excited about spending some time in an exciting city. Back in the day, Miyazaki was Japan’s honeymoon hot spot. It’s referred to as Japan’s Hawaii.