The Himedomachi Cycling Club

(Rumoi Station, abandoned 2016. Editing J Claresby)

eft the hotel at 6.30am. I had asked the receptionist what time the desk opened and she had turned away and spoken through her mask in the extremely formal keigo language for thirty seconds, of which I understood not one word. There was another key there already so I assumed it must be ok.

It was thrilling to travel through the gorge which Booth walked along, on one side the expressway, on the other the railway line. Rumoi station, in the above photo, closed at the end of 2016, and the rails rusted. Hokkaido hosts most of Japan’s self-defence force, and most of its prisons, and I passed a base as I left. The Russian attack, if it ever came, was expected through Rumoi.

At Hekisui my Garmin chirped into life and offered to show me how many calories I’d consumed. Useless piece of rubbish that it is. I took the 275 south towards Tsukigawa, passing a michi no eki, what we would think of as a service station, although architecturally more rustic. A group of taiko drummers wearing blue and white happi coats sat around resting on folding chairs. Like so many other Japanese arts, you don’t just do it, you inhabit it, and it takes a lot of energy to summon the gods with taiko drums.

I passed another bear sign. Next door a man worked in his rice field. Whatever the risk, the rice fields still need to be ploughed, flooded and planted. In another garden an eighty year old woman tended the flowers she’d planted in circles so they looked like enormous pink-purple lily pads from Alice in Wonderland.

Booth carried on towards Tsukigata where he found a ryokan through the tourist office and spent the evening giggling with the maids. The tourist office was closed and presumably the ryokan too, so I turned into Takikawa. I stopped in a convenience store and bought a drink. Across the road there was a restaurant called the Surprised Donkey. I went back into the shop to throw the empty bottle away and the assistant thanked me for my custom when I left.

I cycled down to the 12, a two lane highway, and adopted the age old Japanese tradition of cycling on the pavement. When the kerbs and the manhole covers got too much I bounced onto the road. When the cars and trucks got too much I returned to the pavement. At one point I was forced back onto the pavement by an elderly woman on a bike cycling towards the traffic in the road.

I have a small Swiss cow bell attached to the front of my bike as a warning to bears that I’m coming. Stephen Herrero who wrote ‘Bear Attacks: their causes and avoidance” – a book Bill Bryson commented on saying, “If this isn’t the last word in bear attacks I really, really don’t want to know what is” – is in two minds about bells arguing that a bear might hear someone coming today otherwise they’d overlook. My bell is particularly pathetic. Rather than altering bears, it seems to trill, “Dinner is served.” Not that a bear would hear it. I cycled up behind some middle school students who only heard it as I was upon them.

The wind might have been a notch less strong but it was just as relentless. On this route, at least, there were plenty of places to stop and stretch out. At Sunagawa station I rested on a bench and watched four people get off a train. I ate lunch in a michi no eki and watched a father play with his two daughters in a lush meadow against the backdrop of the distant mountain.

I wasn’t making great time, but felt no desire to speed. I realised I could control the wind, all I had to do was change gears into the bigger, faster ring to turn it up to max. It was nice to rest when I wanted, unlike the road to Teshio, and replenish my water.

The last michi no eki I stopped at was in mock Edo style with half timbered wood climbing to white plastered walls and sloping roofs. There was a bike stand where you could hitch your saddle to a bar, but it was rammed against a wall and I had to move it to use it.

As I wandered up a corridor of shops I became aware of a little boy whose head came up to just above my knee. His eyes opened wide in shock as he realised how tall and foreign I was, as if he’d looked up to find Chewbacca strolling beside him, a laser crossbow slung across the chest.

“Wow! Gaijin are big, aren’t they dad!” he said.

I took my drink to the waterwheel where there was no one and I could do my mysterious gaijin things without being disturbed by curious little boys.

And so passed the day. I am staying in a BnB, hoping I can magic up a conversation with the owner like Booth used to do. Iwamisawa is a poorish town with low rise building and ruler straight streets. Tomorrow is a short day as I have a very long day afterwards. I’d like to get onto the plains a bit, but hope to get to my guest house early as after that Eniwa mountain awaits.