Matsuyama apart
from the castle is another bland Japanese city. But following the
coastline from Hories town is quite pleasant with the Seto sea on the
left. The road is so, so some parts are unkept other parts are well
maintained, still the trucks are present.
As you near
Imbari there are road signs which tell of the underground storage of
oil. Huge underground storage of oil, hard to believe but Japan has
about 90 days supply and that’s a lot of oil. All underground.
Now as my phone
has frozen and been dropped into a river it wasn’t behaving. So
when I arrived in Imbari looking for possibly the longest bridge in
the world. I had to rely on asking for directions. Asking for
directions from locals is an interesting affair. This time I saw a
young couple on bicycles, I stop, and in Japanese I ask where is the
bridge. They were from Taiwan. Very pleasant people , so cheerful.
Off I go picking
up a blue line on the road showing the cycle path until it disappears; you call upon divine intervention and it reappears, seriously
Japan the locals may know where to go, but think about the point of road signs.
They are there to guide people who don’t know how to get a
particular place. One shouldn’t have interrupt a divine being in
order to find the longest bridge in the world.
Once the blue
line had been found and the road wound up to the bridge, I let the
deity go and resumed my travels , I mean I can’t screw this
up , it’s a bridge
Creak,
groan, creak, groan ; up the on ramp onto the bridge, and who should
I meet ! Yes the lovely Tawanese couple. What nice people, if they
are representative of the country then I want to go there,it was a
beautiful day. Warm sunny and the scenery was nice, couldnt complain.
The
bridge is about 70km long (
http://wikitravel.org/en/Shimanami_Kaido_Bikeway)
a bit of a cut and paste follows as well , I cant be arsed repeating
something one can look up by ones self !:
The
Nishi-Seto Expressway, also known as the Seto-uchi Shimanami-Kaido
(highway above sea), was opened to traffic on 1 May 1999. The bridge
connects Onomichi City in Hiroshima and Imabari City in Ehime, as
well as six islands (namely Mukai-shima, Inno-shima, Ikuchi-jima,
Omi-shima, Hakata-jima, and O-shima islands) within the Geiyo Islands
situated near the center of the Seto Inland Sea. The completion of
the Shimanami-Kaido has made Ehime more easily accessible from Honshu
and driving through the Geiyo Islands possible. The highway also
allows passage by bicycle and on foot.
With unique island-to-island bridges, such as the
Tatara-ohashi Bridge (the longest askew-arched bridge in the world)
and the Kurushima-kaikyo-ohashi Bridge (a triple suspension-type
grand bridge), the Shimanami-Kaido provides brand-new scenery in
harmony with insular nature. The best viewing spots to overlook the
bridges over the Seto Inland Sea and various islands are the Hanaguri
Seto observation platform on Omi-shima Island and Mt. Kiro-san on
O-shima Island. Thanks to the mild climate, there are many flower
viewing spots, such as the Yoshiumi Rose Garden (where you can see
various kinds of roses collected from all parts of the world), Citrus
Park Setoda (which boasts citrus plants as the main attraction), as
well as the Inno-shima Flower Center.
Anyway along I went till about 2pm when lunch
called. Came off the bridge and just off the road was a hidden park?,
I didnt want to move! The sun was shining, lunch was good and a nice
cup of tea.
On the subject of tea. I’m English, I’m not
sure one realizes this ! And our DNA needs tea. Now a good cup of
tea is an art, an art derived from centuries of culture. Being from
the east end of london where tea was stolen from the docks and milk
and money was scarce, tea tea needed to be HOT AND STRONG!; Good
quality tea leaves , not this “earl grey sweepings from the bottom
of the warehouse floor packaged in a lovely box. DONT get me started
on starbucks lavender earl grey pure shyt. Thats all I’ll say on
that!
Once you have the the tea leaves, one cup, one
spoonful ! Now add milk; A LITTLE MILK. Not half a cow, or the
entire production of New Zealand dairying industry for 2016. A little
milk and you will enter what some religions call nirvana.
So you can now guess that , it was late when I
finally rejoined the bridge. 5 pm was approaching fast. The next
island was nice enough the road followed the inland sea and some
lovely little villages.
After coming off
the bridge onto Ma island, I came past;. Sunset beach.
Let me explain
sunset beach. Manicured into hell .
A well manicured
dry lawn with a stage and a cinder block toilet inter-dispersed with
the cheapest tannoys you can find spewing forth J-pops. Well it’s
5pm and I can be arsed looking for a place tonight so I decided to
stay. It had showers. Now bear in mind I am the only one there.
1000 yen later
and the tent up. The music stops , thank you. I cooked tea then set
about showering and washing clothes. ( sunlight soap and elbow
grease).
The next morning
, 7am the tannoys start, first to tell you that the cycle path is
open and that Mrs Jones at number 63 has a bad case of thrombosis and
cannot join the glee club coach outing to the community centre. Then
silence . Until 8am then the city hall informs you that it’s time
to get up. Then silence. Until 9am when the J-pops start.
By now I was
ready to kill. Anything and anyone. So I made a comment to a worker
about the noise. He agrees and off he goes. About a hour later the
music stops. I nearly died. Some scratching and shuffling leaked from
the cheapest tannoys on earth then suddenly enka burst forth. FK. The
bastard’s had heard my complaint , but because the rules state this
is how to create a nice environment is to pollute the air with akb
and thinking of the customer , the fkers had searched and found a
record from possibly the 1930s of enka.
Insert total joy
and completeness in peace and harmony. Not.
But what was to
come would more than make up for this. and it was to beat the plastic whale!
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