A memorable start to the day, as we’d signed up for the breakfast at the business hotel, and for less than $5, we had all you can eat Japanese or Western style breakfast – or both if your name is Sam or Max. It led to a delayed, but adequately fueled start to the day. It was a day of mostly busy roads, primarily as taking the non-busy roads would have added extra kilometres to an already long day. But the busy roads were not without interest: a long bridge took us across the Shimanto river, and an even longer tunnel shaved kilometers, time, and considerable effort by going under the hill rather than going up and over it.
The railway bridge across the well channeled Shimanto The view from the road bridge….at this point the river is about 700m acrossTunnel mid point. It’s a toss of a coin as to which way to head if there’s an emergency!
Walking through the tunnels today was quite relaxing: the path was wide (at least a metre) and the cool air a pleasant change from the rampant humidity outside. There were scattered hamlets along the way, and just when we started (once again) to wonder what everyone does, we came across what was, judging by the smell, a seaweed ‘factory’. There must have been 40 cars there, so obviously it is a major employer.
Outside the shop of a former stane sculpture creator, with post closure creativity on display.Biggest bank of vending machines yet. On the right, even icecreams were available ($2 each) and on the left, a machine that dispensed drinks and figurines…. and spoke to us in English, which was a bit freaky! Max is in the middle Max’s new side hustle selling dietary supplements Evening shot in the Tosashimizu harbour as we headed to the onsen to soak our weary bones.
Tomorrow we make a round trip to Temple 38 at the end of Cape Ashizuri. Normally you go down the east coast and back up the west, but as we are already staying on the west side, we’ll likely just do a ‘there and back’ jaunt Besides, we’ve seen adequate ocean shores despoiled by copious quantities of consumer plastic and commercial fishing gear.
In 2009, we embarked on a one-year family sailing adventure aboard a Grand Soleil 39, "SV Mulan". Our original sailing blog is linked on this site.
In 2017, Susan, Andrew, Sam & Max walked the Camino Frances from St-Jean-Pied-de-Porte to Santiago de Compostella (and rode bikes from Burgos to Leon as a blister recovery strategy), and in 2018 Jack also joined the crew as we waled the northern section of the Camino Portuguese from Porto to S de C.
In 2019 Andrew, accompanied by Max for the first few hundred kms, and Susan for the Tiscan section, walked the via francigena from Canterbury to Rome. That journey is blogged in this site.
This blog is planned as an alternative to the endless instagram posts used previously to communicate with those interested in our travels - although there is a linked instagram account as well!
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