Written by Dave

Mitarai, Osaki Shimozima to Hiroshima– Back to the mainland (47k, 460m)

Today’s theme was about finishing up the Tobishima Kaido cycleway and returning to the “mainland”. Counting the island we stayed on, we cycled on four islands today before crossing back to Honshu, the “mainland”. We enjoyed our island time for sure, with so few roads and cars. It also let the steam out of my feud with Wahoo/Komoot – haha.

Starting out this morning on the far side of Osaki-Shimojima, in the rapidly shrinking old town of Mitarai, meant we had no traffic to start and could easily ride two abreast. As we crossed Toyoshima, Kami-kamagari and Shimo-kamigara, the towns got a little bigger and there was a bit more traffic. Don’t get me wrong, it was still very chilled and peaceful riding. If you rode around and over some of the islands, one could easily make the two adjacent cycle routes – Shamanami-Kaido and Tobishima Kaido – into a 10 day tour of Japan. It would be possible to do it without camping/cooking gear and you’d get a great taste of Japan – maybe we should (me and my translator) should start a tour company!

When we crossed the last bridge to Honshu, wow, talk about culture shock. Suddenly we were in the big city of Kure and traffic was full on. Our island adjusted brains had to switch to defensive riding big-time. The road was one lane each way for a while but before long it became 3 lanes each way. Traffic was polite, but there was a lot of it. Surprisingly, the calmest part of the whole last 15k through Kure was riding through the relatively new 2.5k Kure tunnel. They engineered the tunnel in a way that they could glass off the bike/walking lanes from the car lanes inside the tunnels. The glass was thick enough to block the traffic noise; even though you could still see the cars rushing past it was stunningly quiet and calm.

Kure is a pretty big city and home to some of Japan’s biggest ship yards. We caught the ferry in Kure so that we didn’t have to ride more traffic chaos into the bigger city of Hiroshima. On the ride out through the port we passed a couple massive new ships being built – hard to imagine how they even float. Out in the water between Kure and Hiroshima we passed a rusting car transport ship called “Oregon Highway” – probably waiting for a load of cars to be taken back to Oregon.  Portland is still sending and receiving auto shipments, including from Japan.

All this talk of islands got me thinking about Japan, and how many islands make up Japan. It turns out, this is not an easy question to answer. Up until this year, the number used was about 7,500. Over the last couple years, the agency Geospatial Information Authority of Japan, or GSI, took all the latest satellite data, latest maps and geo data (specifically excluding artificially reclaimed land) and came up with the new number of 14,125 – almost twice as many islands.

They detected nearly 100,000 islands but reduced this significantly by including only islands with circumferences of 100 meters or greater. They determined that only about 430 of the islands are inhabited. Which brings me back to the title of this blog. We are now on Honshu. While Honshu is often referred to as the mainland of Japan, it is merely the biggest island and is not a “mainland”.

Once off the ferry in Hiroshima we were back to following our GPS device – we only had 5k to ride to reach our hostel and I’m happy to report that it did a great job. There are 1.2 million folks living in Hiroshima but we reached our hostel (Hostel Mallika) with minimal fuss. We even had time to stop for a snack on the way through town.

Our hostel is right near the Hiroshima Peace dome, which we will visit tomorrow. It also seems to be in an area with lots of young folks. There appear to be a couple universities in our neighbourhood. Some of the young folks may have been in the area for tonight’s Super Beaver concert.  Yeah, I had no idea who Super Beaver was either – even after looking up their biggest hit, I was none the wiser (but not worried about it).

Hiroshima is known for a unique style of okonomiyaki, which is a type of savoury Japanese pancake. So, no prizes for what we did for dinner. In Hiroshima style they cook the batter and filling separately, but in my mind, what makes it truly unique is adding a big serving of Japanese yakisoba noodles to the mix. We just beat the hordes of Super Beaver fans leaving concert finding an empty restaurant right near our hostel. I think we are converts – the Hiroshima okonomiyaki is delicious. By the time we left the restaurant it was packed, and I think it is safe to say, we were the only people there who did not know who Super Beaver was.

Tomorrow will definitely be more sombre than today. But it has to be done. With the war in Ukraine and conflicts percolating elsewhere, visiting the Peace Park seems even more important now than ever. Reports to follow…