Day 8 Rishiri Island-Wakkanai-Hamantonbetsu (via
Toyatomi) 92km (Total 683km)
Today was a long but fun day – I met a Japanese cycle tourist (Taro)
while waiting for the Ferry on Rishiri Island, and chatted to him on the ferry. We were both headed for opposite coasts, so decided to cycle together for 20km along a central-route out of Wakkanai, before heading off in different directions. Taro is a structural engineer (earthquake safety), but hopes to move into photography, so he is taking lots of photos on his cycle through Hokkaido and Honshu.
After we had said our farewells, I had a couple more kilometres along Route 40, before I intended to turn towards the North-East coast line. However, the road I had planned to take to cut across to Hamatonbetsu
ended up being a mororway, which prohibited bicycles, so I had to cycle all the
way to Toyatomi in order to follow the old road to Hamatonbetsu. No worries. It
ended up being a bit of a blessing, really - 48km with very few cars and some nice climbs and descents through the middle of the island.
Because I took the ferry back to Wakkanai in the morning, I didn't start cycling until 10:45am, so it was around 4pm by the time I arrived in Hamatonbetsu, which felt like a really long day.
However, once I arrived at Hamatonbetsu and wheeled down to the camp-site by the lake, I saw a group of American
English teachers who were playing volleyball/eating/drinking at the park, so I
wandered over to say “hi” and ended up joining them for a couple of hours of
volleyball and BBQ dinner/drinks afterwards. It was really fun, and I slept very soundly after a few drinks :)
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