day 129-139, from Fukouka to Kyoto

Day 129, 30 km

I woke up early because the boat was coming to the harbour of Fukouka at five in the morning and my room-mates went up to make breakfast. First at 7:30 we were allowed to disembark. Meanwhile I got a bad headache. When I had passed the customs and got maps and advices from the tourist information it was 10:30. I took my bicycle to the nearest shop and bought some food. Everything was very expensive compared to Korea and especially China. I was in a down and decided to have a resting day. So I went back to the harbour where I knew there was an open Wifi and also electric outlets. There I sat all day updating my blog.

In the evening I rode 30 km. One I discovered that the highway was going above the road in three decks through the city Fukouka.

Day 130, 125 km

I continued further south and soon I passed a village with a church and behind it a giant statue of a woman holding a child.

Some kilometers after that I saw a man who laid chestnuts in big bowls with water. I stopped and watched him and at his work. He did not speak English but he was interested in my journey. I showed him in my worldmap how far I had gone. We talk quite a long time about my journey so I forgot that I originally had stopped to take pictures. Finally I continued on my trip.

After some more kilometers I discovered that the woods around were almost entire bamboo. They were growing so tight that it was impossible to pass and they were about ten meters high

this kind of car is very usual in Japan right now

Suddenly I heard a car shouting (which was very unusual in Japan) and I saw the man I had met one hour before inside. He stopped and gave me a big bag with fruits.

I thanked him and continued some more kilometers when I suddenly saw him again. He stood at the roadside and waved me to stop. 'Eating time' he said and invited me to a restaurant.

 There we ate delicious japanese food.

I showed him many pictures in my camera and told him about my adventures in Korea. Then i continued to Mt Aso, a volcano in the middle of the southern island of Japan. Mt Aso has one of the biggest Calderas of the world (caldera means collapsed Volcano). The caldera is 20-25 km in diameter and in the middle of it there is a high mountain with many peaks and craters. In one of the craters there is an active volcano that produces white clouds of sulphur dioxide. As I had headwind i could smell it already several hours before I came up on the inner mountain. I had to ride over the edge of the caldera which was at about thousand meters above sea level, then several hundred meters down and then up again to a height of over thousand meters again. There I arrived in the evening at 10 and found a good camping ground a wood. Before I fell asleep i heard different owls around me.

Day 131, 65 km

Next morning I could see the wood. There were big kind of Thuja trees around me.

 I continued the last km up to the edge of the highest volcano and saw the sunrise behind the highest top of Mt Aso.

The white cloud you can see is actually the gas from the volcano. I had to wait until 8:30 before I was allowed to climb up. The road next to the cable car had joints every ten meters and you could see that the volcano was expanding. 

 Along the road there were many shelters.

 But then I chose a path which was leading very steep up to a peak behind the crater. there wer no steps or stairs like on the mountains I had visited in China or Korea. I appreciated that very much.

Only yellow marks pointed out the path.

The view was fantastic. 

 Actually there were seven craters on this mountain. I decided to conquer the highest peak which was some kilometer behind the crater.

It was about 1500 m above sea level.

Then I went to a viewpoint behind the crater and took this video: 

 And before I went around the crater I took another one:

 On the northern side of the volcano I was not allowed to walk but I did it anyway. There was an old road which was completely corroded from the sulphur gases.

 Not only the concrete corroded there but also glass, aluminium and wood!

I went back to my bike and enjoyed the ride down from the volcano mountain. The caldera was at 500 m above sea level but then I had to ride up again to the edge of the caldera which was 500 m higher. It really was a big volcano!

Day 132, 125 km

I chose to ride on route 496 towards north. I knew that it was going over another mountain but I had decided that I liked mountains!

Along the road I saw one of the typical Japanese Thujas which was bigger than usual. The trunk was much bigger than my bicycle.

I followed a river upstreams to the next pass.

The water was clear and it was hot so i decided to take a bath.

The the valley became more and more narrow.

 Finally also the road was also very steep and narrow.

 After many serpentines I finally came to the highest point at 730 m. There almost no cars on this road so I had it all for myself when i rode down on the other side.

Amongst others I passed this old temple om my way back to Fukouka.

 I arrived the town when it already was dark and when I tried to ride over the bridge i was stopped at the toll gate. There was a tunnel for bikers, they told me. The tunnel was not so easy to find but two girls helped me. We had to take an elevator down and then walk almost two km under the ocean.

  I was not allowed to ride in they tunnel they told me with a severe voice.

 I slept on the beach close to a supermarket where I bought a lot of groceries for the next day.

Day 133-136, 470 km
Next morning I woke up some minutes before sunrise.

 I continued along the coast towards west. I realized that the japanese inventors are perfectionists. All reflexes along the road had propellers so they were cleaning themselves windy days. And it really worked!

But for bicycler Japan was not a good country. There was no space for them on the roads so they were supposed to ride on the sidewalks. There were pretty good ramps up and down from the sidewalks but they were 20-30 cm high so I had to slow down all the time. Once I did not slow down enough my (already worn out) rear tire almost exploded.

I had to change the rear tire for the second time...

I also had to change three more spokes on the rear tire, which surely must depend on all the shaking on the sidewalks and their ramps. Besides from this Japan has red lights everywhere and everybody stops and waits until they become green again (this was not the case in China!). And on many bridges and tunnels it is not allowed to ride a bicycle. The mainroad often goes on a bridge over a crossing road and you have to go down. There you loose all speed when you have to stop at the red light...

But there are funny vehicles in Japan!

 I also found some company for my bike

 Japanese people seem to love tunnels. Sometimes there are four next to each other and there are sidewalks in them where you can ride.
 
Or there are no sidewalks but they are still allowed for bicycles because there is no other option.

This tunnel had a sidewalk which was only 50 cm broad but still 25 cm high. When I tried to keep as much left as possible I scratched my bag so it is not waterproof any more...

Now the sun sets early so I ride also in the evening when it is dark. Sometimes the road ends unexpectedly and I have to climb long stairs above mountains where the cars are allowed to go through tunnels...

The night  after day 136 I had passed Okayama and Hiroshima and I slept in the castle park of Himeji.

Day 137, 75 km

In the park i found an exhibition of bonsai trees and other plants.

 The castle which is quite famous was unfortunately covered for renovating job. In the tourist office I was told it should be covered only two more years...

 Instead i took a picture of a side wing and a poster where you can see the castle when it is not covered. (the inserted picture is a picture of the covering).

 That day I made some important phonecalls from the Wifi of the tourist office because as a foreigner I was not allowed to buy a japanese sim-card and open wifi's are very difficult to find in Japan. So I first at 10:30 I came to the yacht harbour of Himeji.

 There I met a very nice guy who really did all he could to help me to find a yacht to Canada. He was a boat builder and had been thinking about going by bicycle through Europe. He called many friends but nobody could help me. as it was lunchtime he suggested we could eat lunch together. He drove me to a restaurant but it was closed because there was some new year celebration the day before. many restaurants were closed  that day but finally we found a good one

and he paid a delicious meal for me.

 Then he wished me good luck and I continued. It was already 2:30 pm so I did not ride so much that day.

 In the evening I passed some more harbours but I only god nice pictures, no advices how to find a ship to Canada.

Day 138, 75 km
I woke up at 5:45 am finding myself on a sport ground in the middle of Kobe. I scared a black American tennis trainer who had come to have his first lesson which started at 6. But he had appreciation for my situation and soon I was gone to find some more yacht harbours on the way to Osaka. It started to rain that day so I was happy that there was a steiner school in Kyoto where i possibly could stay some days. On the way i passed a pink bridge in Osaka.

I had tried to contact the school several times but the email-address of the international waldorfschool-list was not right and they had no phone. But the building was not difficult to find with google maps. You could see it from outside that it was a waldorfschool.

 also the inside was typical waldorf, although maybe cleaner as usual. Everywhere were pupils which cleaned everything. They had their cleaning hour (they did not have any stuff to do the cleaning!)

 After I had told that I could tell some pupils about my journey and show some pictures the next day Kristiane, the eurythmi teacher offered me to stay in her house.

 And it was really good to sleep inside a home again after one and a half months! I slept heavily while the rain was pouring outside...

Day 139, 12 km
Kristiane had a good wifi. She gave me her password so I could do some more investigations about cargo shipping to Canada and I also could prepare pictures I wanted to show for class 8. At 10:30 we rode to the school and I told about my journey for class 8. The evening before I had shown pictures for the classteacher and she translated my English to japanese. She had told me that several guys in the class were very interested in cycling.
I think everybody enjoyed to hear my story and see some pictures. I told the pupils that they could help me to find a boat and gave them my email in case they found one.

Everybody in the school was very busy to prepare a harvesting festival which is this weekend. So in the afternoon i helped them to fetch some bamboo from a wood nearby. One teacher said that they are growing so fast and so close that during the war, when people were hiding in the woods, they could get stuck between the stems!

 Of course we used Japanese saws to cut them down (the cut when you pull)

We had a lot of fun in the wood. Then we carried three 8 m long stems to the schoolyard.
The music teacher (who lives in the same house as Kristiana) invited me to precipitate at a rehearsal of the teachers songs which they will perform this weekend. It was very good for me to sing and also to see so many happy teachers!

Kristiane offered me to stay another night which is very good, because now i can write the blog while it is raining outside.