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  • Last time, I told you about how I left my job and moved out of my apartment in Tottori,

  • took the ferry to Hokkaido, and cycled around for 3 weeks.

  • I visited 4 National Parks. Rishiri and Rebun Islands

  • Shiretoko Akan

  • and Daisetsuzan before arriving in Sapporo.

  • The plan was to ride all the way down to Cape Sata in Kagoshima.

  • But first it was time to go back home to Ireland to visit family and friends.

  • Ok, and I'm back on the bike trip. It's now Autumn. It's a lot colder than before.

  • Last night I went out and planned to camp. And test out my gear.

  • But I got caught in torrential rain and didn't even make it to the campsite.

  • So I was camping just here in this little park.

  • Pretty close to the main road but... I'm ready to go now. The bike's all packed.

  • Two months to get to Okinawa. Should be good.

  • As you may know Japan is made up of 4 main islands.

  • And to get from Hokkaido to Honshu, I had to get down to Hakodate to take the ferry to Aomori.

  • My next plan was to meet a friend and hike Mt. Yotei, but it was covered in snow,

  • so we decided to climb a smaller mountain instead.

  • We climbed from afternoon and made it up in time to drink a beer at sunset,

  • sleep in the hut at the top of the mountain, and wake up in time for sunrise.

  • Although we couldn't climb Mt Yotei, the view we had of it was amazing!

  • I set up my tent in a park the following day, and as I lay down to sleep, I could hear the

  • fire brigade driving around with loudspeakers telling people to turn on their heating.

  • Unfortunately I didn't have any.

  • Well, it was pretty cold last night. And there's frost everywhere.

  • So last night was the coldest night so far. I woke up with frost all over my tent.

  • Oh, my hand are cold.I really need gloves. I dunno why I haven't bought gloves yet.

  • Just in time for sunrise!

  • Ok, and now I'm on Honshu. I'm in Aomori Prefecture.

  • And, it's a lot hotter here. I didn't sleep much on the night ferry,

  • but I'm going to go to a campsite that's not so far.

  • So I'm finally going to get off the main road. I've been following that for a while but...

  • too many cars, too noisy. And, I'm going to try and go a quieter way.

  • Yeah, it was good roads for a while. And now it's this.

  • But, hopefully it gets me there. I don't wanna go back.

  • Not unreasonable for a bike though.

  • And now we're in a forest. And I've seen signs for bears,

  • so I don't know how much I like this detour. But we'll see.

  • I probably didn't have much to worry about, but some people had been killed by bears in

  • the Tohoku Region in the past few years, and I hadn't planned to be in a forest today.

  • And after seeing a bear in Hokkaido, they were on my mind a bit.

  • And we're back on the good roads. No more fear of bears.

  • Although one will probably jump out and get me now.

  • I've just spend the last while cycling uphill and

  • I got to this free campsite. Just after I arrived, and old man came up,

  • and got me to sign in. And he's spent the past 15 minutes cleaning.

  • But hopefully I get a good view tomorrow.

  • And I was complaining about it all day but there was all these apple trees.

  • And I was thinking "why has nobody given me an apple"

  • But just before I got up here. A van stopped and a guy got out and

  • here I've got it.

  • It was a pretty bad typhoon so I booked into a hostel for two days to stay safe and keep

  • an eye on weather reports.

  • Ah, it's so nice to get back out on the bike after two days of sitting in the hostel.

  • It's 6 degrees! I was planning to just head south, try and

  • get to Tokyo, but everyone has recommended that I go and

  • see this gorge. Oirase Gorge.

  • Hopefully it's worth it. We'll find out.

  • But the real shame is missing out on The Grave of Christ.

  • But, 30km the wrong direction and I just don't have time.

  • Ok, it's 4.45pm which is sunset time. And I've just a little more to go to the campsite.

  • Another 6 or 7km. I can see the mountain I was hoping to climb

  • but it looks like it's covered in snow so yeah, I'm not going to be doing that.

  • It's another frosty morning. And I've just stayed at this campsite last night,

  • I think I'm the only person at the campsite again.

  • I haven't stayed at a campsite with anyone else yet. Just in time for sunrise.

  • And, yeah. There definitely a bit of snow on that mountain.

  • I'm going to try and do another 100km+ today and just get further south as quick as I can.

  • It's pretty cold, and snow is going to be coming soon.

  • I was enjoying the challenge of cycling in the cold weather,

  • but I was glad to be moving south through the prefectures.

  • Although I'd camped almost every night in summer,

  • this was more difficult now because of the shorter days.

  • I started to look for people to stay with through websites like Couchsurfing and Warmshowers.

  • So was great to finish off this stage of the trip by meeting up with some friends for drinks

  • and dinner, and to have a place to stay for the night.

  • It was nice to look at what I'd already cycled on the map.

  • From here the plan was to continue South to Tokyo, then visit my old hometown, Tottori

  • on the way to the south point of Japan.

Last time, I told you about how I left my job and moved out of my apartment in Tottori,

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