Steps: 23.358 (22,1km)
Temples: None
We fell right asleep after dinner last night and didn’t get up again for 10 hours. Still, the 16km to Shimanto felt longer than usual, but we managed with a diet consisting of curry, ice cream and technicolor drinks.
This morning I had the rather ingenious idea of renting electric bicycles when we got to Shimanto, and I think it might have been the best 4000¥ we have spent so far.
Damn it felt good to be off our feet, cruising through the city with no resistance, even up the hills. Electric bikes are very popular in Denmark, but I’ve never tried one myself before. I definitely see the appeal now though …
Shimanto river is home to over 70 species of dragonflies and a little outside the city lies a dragonfly museum and conservation park. We only saw 3 dragonflies in total, so might have been a little too early in the season. But the weather was nice and we didn’t have to walk so no complaints.
Jonas’s birthday is this weekend, so we have also spent some of today trying to figure out where we want to be for the celebration. He has decided that he would prefer to be in a city and take the whole day off from walking. Sukumo on the west coast is the next logical place that fits the description, so we have a couple of long days ahead, but nothing we haven’t tried before 😅
Also, I think I might have unlocked a new level in my Japanese journey today, when I successfully made the reservation for the hotel we will stay at in Sukumo. As I have mentioned before, speaking Japanese over the phone is not my favorite activity, and so far we have had the staff at our lodging help us out with reservations.
But you never learn if you never try I guess. Thus, armed with google translate I managed to stammer through a whole booking-conversation (time will tell if it was the right one) and now I feel like I have earned at least three of the little stickers my Japanese teacher used to give to the ones who completed the extra homework assignments 😅