Though I had thought of moving to Japan for many years, and I did a long distance hike last year. It wasn’t until I heard of ‘Kintaro Walks Japan’ that I thought of putting my two interests together. Kintaro, or Tyler as he’s known in real life, was inspired by Ayumi whose dad still holds [...]

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More grey skies this morning, but the rain held off. With fresh supplies from the nearest Seicomart convenience store (of which Wakkanai probably has 200), Tania and I started the 30km walk north east along the coast to Cape Soya. The wind was against us the whole way, with shelter provided in the half-dozen small [...]

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There will now be a brief intermission.
 
Word of the day: i-sho-ni = together

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Day 94 and I’m on the northern most coast of Japan. I have seen the peninsula that I’ll be walking along a couple of days from now but the cape is out of sight until the last few kilometres.
 
The feeling of non-Japan, or maybe the lack of Japanese feeling continued today. For the 35km that [...]

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The town of Nakagawa was still asleep when I passed through just before 5am. There were clouds still sitting on the low hills that create this valley but the sky was starting to clear. For 10 hours I walked without taking a break. There was nowhere but the roadside to sit and I had no [...]

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The day started, that is the daylight part of today, hours before that I’d woken to see clouds rolling over the hills in darkness, with a hearty breakfast courtesy of Barabara’s campsite neighbour Sato-san (not to be confused with the Sato-san I met at Takochi-dake Onsen). A light salad, chunky vegetables in a thick sauce [...]

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The most interesting part of today was not that I’ve been rained on for the seventh day running. It’s not that I considered this a ’short’ day at only 38km nor that I’ve got shin-splints and the other shoulder of my favourite hiking shirt is starting to rip. Staying at Nayoro road station was interesting, [...]

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From the road station called Toma at Pippu I walked 12 hours north to one near the town of Nayoro. I saw four small shrines, notable because Hokkaido doesn’t have as many as the other islands since it only became part of Japan relatively recently.
I think someone offered me a lift today, or they [...]

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I’ve not even covered 10km today and until an hour ago nothing had really happened, except the torrential rain.
Here at the Toma road-station I’ve been wasting time all afternoon, writing a list of places Tania and I will go and visit (reader suggestions are welcome, leave a comment or use the ‘Contact Me’ page), [...]

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When pointing out one’s self in a conversation, for example “I am going to buy this”, the Japanese point to their faces, or more exactly their noses, while westerners point to their chests.
 
A long and winding descent from Asahidake Onsen this morning. The weather was good and I briefly considered taking the cable-car back up [...]

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