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 [...]
2008-07-18 The End
July 18th, 2008
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 [...]
2008-07-17 Reunion
July 17th, 2008
There will now be a brief intermission.
Word of the day: i-sho-ni = together
2008-07-16 Reaching Wakkanai
July 16th, 2008
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 [...]
2008-07-15 Counting down
July 15th, 2008
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 [...]
2008-07-14 Pace
July 14th, 2008
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 [...]
2008-07-13 Barabara
July 13th, 2008
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, [...]
2008-07-12 Road station hop
July 12th, 2008
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 [...]
2008-07-11 Rain day
July 11th, 2008
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), [...]
2008-07-10 Sign Language
July 10th, 2008
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 [...]