This is just a test post to see if the email notification is working. Sorry to spam you all. :/

I’ve thrown this panorama in for eye candy so you won’t hit me. I managed to recover some photos that I thought I lost from our ride around Yakashima… this was one of them.

N

It used to get so frustrated when I had to sit still for a long time, but now I almost relish in it. I’ve spent days at a time now on trains and in transit and each time I think it gets easier, and my patience increases. It’s nice to not have any distractions… to jut sit and ponder for hours on end. Dozing off… waking up… looking around… It was an early start this morning.   Was out of bed by 3:30am, walking to the train station as snow was falling. It was a nice surprise that Dave got up and walked me to the station. We cooked up porridge in the foyer of the station, and I was on my first train by 4:50am. Being Saturday morning it was obvious that Fukouka is a party city. With one of the main streets translating roughly to ’street of the unruly children’. It has been a great experience traveling with Dave, perhaps one of the best… been so refreshing and spontaneous, with a healthy focus on outdoors adventure. Thanks Dave I look forward to traveling together again sometime in the future.

We stayed in one of Japans infamous cyber cafes. They are really something… for a techno-traveller like my self the are a small piece of heaven. For about 2/3rd the price of a youth hostel you get 12 hours in a cyber cafe business booth… the booth is about 2.5m x 2.5m, consists of a raised floor that is padded (perfect for sleeping on), a computer, TV, Game Console, and high speed internet. Out of the booth you have unlimited access to DVD, cartoon books (very popular in japan), free drinks and ice cream, shower, bathroom and laundry room, and more I’m sure.

After the natural beauty of Yakashima, and the beautiful island hospitality Fukouka seemed just like another big city, complete with pollution, noise, cars and lots of people. I made a remark to Dave that we need to reinvent cities…. we need cities 3.0. Cities 1.0 didn’t really work, everyone got sick and they were extremely polluted at the beginning of the industrial revolution. We realised this and moved onto cities 2.0, where industry is restricted to certain areas, and regulated to ensure a more healthy environment. Cities 2.0 is still a bit of a compromise as they incorporate technology and aspects that we know to be unhealthy, but for the time being the benefits seems to outweigh the costs. For example cars and roads to move people and things. And the lack of open social place. There is also a high focus on spending money in cities, that detracts from meaningful social interaction. Or at the very least complicates social interaction by tying it up with money. Perhaps cities 3.0 will find better ways to move people and goods, freeing up the space used for roads, and reducing visual, audible and chemical pollution. Incorporation of green spaces and more free/ low cost opportunities for social interaction. I believe society has already realised this and some people are tugging in that direction, there is just a huge amount of momentum and embedded resources that will have to be replaced slowly over a long period.

There really hasn’t been much else happening since we finished the cycling tour of Yakashima. Got the ferry back to the mainland, camped in a park in Kagoshima, trained it to Fukouka, did a lot of walking around the city. Ate Japanese famous rammen (noodles), by the river and drank a some nice beer. The rammen vendors in Fukouka are interesting, these guys work pretty hard. Setting up and packing up there stores almost every day of the year. They are in fierce competition with each other and hustle for business.

Right now I’m on my… ahh… 5th or 6th train for the day. I’d already been on 3 trains before the sun came up! I’m using the 18-kippu again, which means I can travel on local (slow) trains only for 24 hours using just one ticket for about AU$32. So with some help from the lovely Japanese Rail workers I’ve worked out how to get back to Gifu in about 14 hours, covering over 700km. it goes like this:
Hakata > Kokura > Shimon Seki > Tokuyama > Itozaki > Fukuyama > Okayama > Aioi > Himeji > Maibara > Nagoya > Gifu!!!!
That is 11 trains! In one day! Its pretty impressive that they all run on schedule to the minute… and that the staff anywhere in the country provide all the information without the use of a computer system. There is a book as thick as a textbook with all the timetables in it. Not quite what I expected for Japan, but I think they figure why fix it if it ain’t broke.

Anyways, thats about it for now.

Hope things are good with you all, look forward to hearing what you’ve been up too!

Nathan

Disclaimer: I can’t do this trip justice in words or photos, but I’ll do my best.

What’s the goings on of late I hear you ask? Good question. Well after Maki left Dave took a shining to my idea if riding around the island, so we hired bike and hit the road. the island is only about 150km in circumference, however we had been told 300 by some people. Anyway, it turned out to be very hilly! In parts we rode from sea level up about 500m, back down again, then up again, repeat over. By the end my perception of what level ground was had been warped. I’d be riding along, and think, ‘o sweet a flat… I can coast here for a while and let my legs rest..’, then I’d come to a sudden stop. ‘Hu??… o bugger, this must be up hill!’

Day 1 – rode 20km to an onsen and back to town just because we had bikes with gears and could ;). The onsen was on the beach, most beautiful. On the way back I discover a new passion, night riding. It was so peaceful. No cars, just us, the stars, beach and wide open road. Think I’ll plan a few full moon rides in Europe.

Day 2 – rode about 30km over hilly terrain and realised how far around the island we had come, almost half way. Decided to ride a few km back to a light house and stay there for the night. Was a really nice peaceful night. Spent a while looking out over the ocean just generally blissing out.

Day 3 – rode about 50km, the most hilly part, but the most beautiful. The world heritage area went right to the edge of the island in the area. It was thick rainforest, and a single lane road winding through the forest, over mountains, and several km of only down hill coasting!! Most fun! Stopped several times to check out the local monkeys, who were the best behaved monkeys I’ve ever seen. Stayed the night beside a football oval after Dave lost his beanie and road back 10km to get it… I just went to another onsen that was so hot it almost left burn marks.

Day 4 – Realising that we only have about another 50km to go on our ride, we decide to climb a mountain about the size of Mt Warning (1100m?)… This turned out to be most epic. While only about a 4km walk, 90% of the walk was uphill at a gradient of between 35-70deg! Nothing like Mt Warning at all. What a leg killer. It was only possible to climb due to complete coverage of the forrest floor with dense root system. With beer at the end of the tunnel we rode on 20km to Anbo, to wine and dine at the finest (only) izakaya in town. Below are some ramblings from the night. Hope you get a laugh out of it.

Day 5 – We wake with a hang over, but most content with how the night played out. Enjoying good japanese company, live music, local cuisine, Japanese famous drinks, getting offered a warm place to sleep, more dinner, breakfast and lunch! Its hospitality like this that has been giving me a new look on life. Why would someone do so many nice things for a complete stranger?? It really is heart warming and I hope I can carry a little bit of Japanese hospitality around inside me long after I leave Japan. We eventually make tracks, jumping back on the bikes for the final 30km back to Miyanora, our starting point.

Izakaya Ramblings

We roll into town. Exhausted after a massive climb and brisk ride. We find a place to plug in and use the internet for free in an onsen for a couple of hours … but not before having a massive feed from the supermarket (most affordable place to eat on a budget). We then proceeded in a state of exhaustion to find an izakaya, it was closed, then another, it was out of business… so we looked for the infamous red lanterns. Success! Izakaya ichi ban in Anbo! We get settled in the izakaya, leaving our bikes out the front. Sure enough a few people in the place have passed us on the road traveling around the island. They greet us with warm welcomes and the bartender, Anubol, tries to help us decipher the menu. I want chicken kebabs figuring I’ve lost a few kilos and need to gain some wait after all this riding and hiking. (my belt buckles is way below its lowest hole despite my best efforts to fatten myself up). So it is we ask for Anubol (the bar staffs recommendations… diajiobu… what ever you say… we can’t read the menu. Feed us we are hungry. The food arrives. Yumminess… I don’t even know what i’m eating and it doesn’t matter. because I’m so hungry and its is nutritious. I am sure that the level of japanese I can speak when I drink doubles or triples. Things just become so much easier. Why is that? Someone do a study and give me results damn it. Anyway they feed us and we order a few beers. That is enough… the locals take a shining to us and a local carpenter that has seen us riding around the island invites us…. in a very convoluted fashion to his house… our level of japanese comprehension’s very low and we could well and truly be getting into an orgy with his wife… but no. After a while a new character arrives and sings a few songs, and we order yet again more food, we work out that we are indeed getting invited back to his home to stay in the gauge. Since it is a fricking cold, and almost rainy nighy, we follow the grunk carpenter home, all in good spirits and having a laugh. I’ve given up trying to communicate in Japanese now and just have a big smile on my face and am talking in drunk language (a hybrid of world languages and universal symbology)… so how far is your place… ahhh…. reply in japanese…. second street on the right…. awesome…. japan is random.

*falls asleep with laptop on chest*

…

Ieeee… my head. Water stat. What a night. I’m back in the expensive onsen place that has free internet in the foyer. That was all written last night after so many drinks. Then we went inside for dinner after getting home late… and he gave us more Japanese famous shochu made with water from the region. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shochu)… also of interest was the awesome flying fish that is a Japanese famous delicacy. We ate lots of that… come raw in slices with a little soy and wasabi. Such an awesome night. I spent more than I usually do, but then we didn’t have to pay for accommodation so it all works out. This morning we got a big breakfast, and lunch to go all courtesy of our friend from the bar. Seems like lots of people have seen us riding around the island and are impressed… its such a nice feeling when people are genuinely amused by something simple you have done… They were such nice people, he said we could stay there anytime we wanted! He must not have told his wife that we were coming because she had a friend over, and we walked up to the door and looked in… we heard them say gaijin gaijin… (foreigner foreigner…) but she warmed to us… and was calling us cute this morning. :).

Ahhh… good times.