Sunrise Itoyama
We left our hotel early and drove an hour up to Sunrise Itoyama, on the top coast of Shikoku. Here we were collecting a pair of e-bikes for another day of cycling.
We were planning to do the southern half of the Shimanami Kaido, after doing the northern half back in 2016. This is popular cycle route that goes along a chain of islands that connect the mainland with shikoku and is a nice mix of coastal roads and huge suspension bridges. You can do the entire route in a day if you are fast, but you need accommodation pre-arranged at the other end. We wanted to keep things flexible and be able to change days depending on the weather, so that’s why we’ve only done it as out and back day trips covering half of the full route (even though we cycled the same distance as doing the full thing!)
Kurushima Bridge
Our starting point was very close to the long Kurushima bridge. After making our way up the spiralling bike trail up to the height of the road (thank you e-bikes for making that easy!) we were on the 4km stretch of suspension bridge
The cycle route on the islands generally follows small roads and dedicated cycle paths up to and down from the bridges, however the bridges themselves are part of an expressway, so a bit busier. The cycle route is completely separate from the road though, so you can stop and look at the view of the surround islands as much as you want.
An example of one of the cycle lanes down from the bridge, they are fun to zoom down (sensibly of course, don’t want to collide with someone coming up the path)!
Oshima Island
The first island we would be cycling through as Oshima. There are rest stops all along the route, so we made a stop at the first of these, Yoshiumi Iki-iki-kan and bought some puddings made with different types of local oranges to try whilst enjoying the view.
We then carried on our cycling, through the middle of the island of Oshima up to the north coast
Hakata Oshima Bridge
The next bridge then appeared, a much shorter suspension bridge connecting Oshima with the next island, Hakatajima
Hakatajima Island
The cycle route is just a short stretch of coast on Hakatajima, but it does have a large rest stop with a beach and aquarium. We stopped and had a little karaage chicken snack.
Omishima Bridge
It wasn’t long at all till we were are at Omishima Bridge and then on Omishima Island
Tatara Shimanami Park
Following the pretty coast road of Omishima, we headed to the ‘cycling oasis’ rest stop next to Tatara bridge.
Tatara Bridge
Tatara Bridge marked our turn-around point for the day. We cycled over it and then came back again, but we could at now say we have cycled all of the bridges of the shimanami kaido, as we did the other 3 in 2016
Directly under the towers of these bridges are wooden blocks you can hit together and hear the unusual echoes produced, or the ‘dragon’s roar’ as it’s been called.
Nice touch burger
Now we had made it to our turn around point, it was time for a tasty late lunch. We went a little off the official route to nice touch burger, were we had the best burgers and potatoes we’ve had in Japan! And it was so nice sitting outside looking towards the sea whilst eating.
Back to the start
Now it was time to retrace our route all the way back to Sunrise Itoyama. Even though we’d just done the same route, it was still nice to cycle it again, seeing things from a different angle and stopping at different views!
By the time we were at the long Kurushima bridges, the sun was setting which made for some lovely views for the last stretch.
And finally, back where we started the day!
Hama Sushi
We decided to stop as a near by Hama Sushi for dinner. It’s a popular chain and we were there right at dinner time, so I think we ended up waiting about an hour for a space but I was just glad to be sitting on something that wasn’t a saddle, so didn’t mind waiting!
It was our first time trying Hama and it was good, similar to Kura sushi, with a variety of non-fish options
Setouchi Resort Hotel
e were supposed to be continuing to stay at the Toyoko Inn in the centre of Matsuyama for 2 more nights, but, whilst there is nothing wrong with a Toyoko Inn and we’ve stayed for many many nights at them in the past, it seems that we are now too old to find their very hard beds comfy! Since they will refund nights you don’t stay, we opted to find an alternative place for our last two nights in the area, and ended up at a seaside resort hotel just outside the city. The room was massive and more importantly, the beds were super comfy!
