Thursday October 9, 2025

This was the best ride to date. Even though we rode an extra 5 kms and went up a 2km hill that topped out at 8. %, that we didn’t need to do.

This hotel had a very interesting layout. This was the open concept staircase.

We had a mediocre breakfast at the hotel and headed out at just after 9:00 a.m. It seemed as if we were out of Himeji in minutes. The route was so easy to follow. I didn’t want to jinx it by saying “Wow we got out of Himeji easily”. I kept my mouth shut. At 25 kms the route had taken us away from big cities and major highways, the roads were relatively quiet, and we were enjoying the ride.

The projected distance was 55 kms. We stopped for lunch, and while Ralf was taking a photo of our lunch, I took photos of the ladies toilet!!

Photos of toilet signs – graffiti?

We carried along a mix of quiet roads, with lovely scenery.

I knew we had a couple of climbs, but I was feeling strong, and I didn’t need to push my bike up any of these hills. The third climb kicked up to 8% and yes I pushed it for about 500 metres. We got to an area where Highway 250 and Highway 2 merged, RidewithGPS gave us a quieter road through a couple of villages and along the Shinkansen line. It was then that we realized we may have overshot our end point. Looking at where we were on the map and where we were spending the night it indicated we were heading towards Bizen not Hinase. We had added an extra climb and 5 kms. As I looked around me all I could see was hills, we were in a valley, and it looked as though we were going to have to climb again. My heart sank a little, but Ralf took us on a quiet valley road and before I knew it we were outside of our accommodation.

We are in a Hostel type accommodation, shared bathroom, and kitchen facilities. When I look for a hotel room I generally do not want a shared bathroom, but in Japan a shared bathroom could mean an ensuite, you are sharing it with the other person in the room. In this case we were sharing it with the other person in the other room.

Cameron from Guelph, Ontario was also cycling Japan. We had a quick chat as he arrived, and we were leaving to get something for dinner.

A good day.