Vaucluse Dreamer

We woke with the sunrise and sat watching the boats potter out of the port, as we had our first coffee of the day, and decided what to do.

It was a calm morning, and we had wanted to take a short bike ride out along the coast, so planned that, followed by an onsen (as there was one just opposite), before we would head on to visit the vine bridges and explore the Iya Valley.

In theory, it sounded like the perfect day. In practice, it ended up being a white knuckle ride of disappointment. In fact, I’m only writing this now, as when we arrived at the park-up last night, my knuckles were so tight from being clenched for the entire afternoon, that I really couldn’t type.

Once we’d had breakfast, we hopped on the bikes and pedalled out along the quiet road that ran along the back of the beach, following it East, towards a little headland I’d found, which looked like a pretty place for a drink, before heading back.

To begin with, it was lovely, but after a few kilometres, lorries appeared from nowhere and it suddenly felt as if we were on a motorway. It was part of the ‘Round Shikoku Cycle Route’, but it was incredibly busy and not pleasant to ride at all. After a particularly close pass, where a wing-mirror of a lorry passed within a few centimetres of Andy’s helmet, we decided enough was enough, and turned round to head back.

It isn’t often that we feel we don’t want to continue a ride, but it’s happened twice on Shikoku now, where the roads have hit towns, or areas used by lorries to avoid Expressway Tolls. For us, cycling is all about the enjoyment of the ride, and for some reason, here it hasn’t always been happy cycling, due to the weight of traffic and the close passes.

But, we had a little ride, (with a couple more close passes on the way back, justifying our decision to turn round), and were ready to head on. Our plan for an onsen also turned on its head, when we found that the one opposite didn’t open until 3. So. we would find one later, as there seemed to be a number, where we were heading.

Looking back on it now, it felt as if the day was trying to give us a message to change our plans. How, we wished we had taken note and looked again at what we were going to do, as the day didn’t improve. In fact, it got worse. A lot worse.

We had looked at the route, we planned to take to get to and through the Iya Valley, as we were still a little wary of the smaller roads after our 12km trip up a single track, forest road to the Shikoku Karst. But, when I looked at ‘StreetView’ 3 out of the 4 pieces of the road that I clicked on were wide, 2 lane, well-marked stretches of road, with the others being single track.

A 3 out of 4 score on good roads seemed positive, so we planned the route through to the vine bridges, at Kazurabashi and a little further on, with a visit to the surreal village of Nagaro, where residents who have left have been replaced with scarecrows.

It seemed like a great way to pass the afternoon. How did we get it so wrong?

The road through to Kazurabashi was OK, steep and busy in places, but we pootled on, stopping for lunch at a little roadside station, and celebrating managing to dispose of some rubbish (always a good day).

We continued on, arriving in what we imagined to be a small village, to find a busy tourist spot, with buses, chauffeured mini-vans and people everywhere. We pulled into one of the carparks, popped our 400 yen parking fee in the letterbox, and took a walk to find the bridge.

All we needed to do was follow the stream of people, heading through the large visitor centre and shop, down the road, passing the BBQ fish stalls, to find it.

It is a very pretty bridge, suspended over the river, twisted with vines, holding up planks of wood, to make the path across. It was only as we walked around to pay to cross (550yen each) that we noticed that the vine supports were wrapped around high tensile steel ropes, which rather ruined it for us.

It went from being a wonderful and fascinating bridge to something from Disneyland and any excitement we had about seeing it and also crossing it, went out of the window.

Yes, it was very pretty, but that was it, so we popped our money back in our purse and wandered down to see the Biwa waterfall instead. That was very pretty, and as the rain started to fall, we wandered back to the van with a taste of disappointment in our mouths.

That said, we would be passing 2 more on our way to Nagaro, so perhaps they wouldn’t be quite as theme-parky. So in we hopped, looking forward to exploring the ‘Scarecrow Village’. That was when the day took a turn for the worse.

As we set off out of the village, following the only road to Nagaro, we edged our way through a narrow street, having to stop for a bus, a few cars and another campervan, the size of ours. It was just the village, we thought, acknowledging that when it was built, there were no vehicles, so it would be tight, but at least it would improve on the far side, which it did …. To begin with

To cut a very long story short, it didn’t last long.  In fact, it just got worse and then worse again. There were stretches of 2 lanes, which must have been the ones that I had clicked on, but they were few and far between, with hideously narrow stretches of winding road, with a rock wall on one side, and a sheer drop on the other, with just a bent and precarious-looking barrier between the road and a big drop.

The mirrors on all the bends became a life-line, and I was watching those, as Andy focused on the road. It was like rally-car driving at a snail’s pace, as I looked ahead to tell him ‘sharp left, right or hairpin ahead’

We couldn’t bail out, as there was literally nowhere wide enough to consider doing even a 23 point turn, let alone a 3 point turn, and no other roads we could take either.

Also, it wasn’t quiet. It is the only road through to Nagaro and the other 2 vine bridges, which meant there was tourist traffic mixed with logging lorries, work lorries, and even cement mixers coming towards us. It was utterly terrifying, and there was nothing we could do, but keep going for what turned out to be 75km of nail-biting, knuckle-clenching twists and turns.

At least Andy is an expert at reversing with mirrors, and found himself reversing not just in the face of lorries, but also little cars, where the drivers looked too terrified to do anything, but keep going forwards.

By the time we reached the next vine bridges, we felt we couldn’t stop, as we knew what still had to be done, although (if you fancy the drive) they did look less ‘Disney’ than the first one, and certainly a lot quieter, but I understand why

Then, as we rolled into Nagaro, and started to catch sight of all the scarecrows set up in vignettes and en masse at the side of the road and in buildings too, the heavens opened.

By now, we had lost our sense of humour, and parked in the little car park to take stock, deciding to go on to Mount Tsurangi, where there appeared to be car parks, where we could stop for the night and (like the Karst) get up early in the morning to drive off the mountain.

The next 14km to the summit made the first part of the drive seem simple, as we drove into the cloud, which reduced visibility even more. The mirrors on the bends were almost ineffective, and at times, heavy fallen branches blocked some of the carriageway too.

As we rounded another bend, we caught sight of something coming down the bank towards the road, thinking it was an animal, but it turned out to be a large rock that bounced across just infront of us, and Andy put his foot down, worried that bigger rocks would follow.

At Tsurangi, where we had pinned our hopes on finding a car park, where we could stop for the night, everything was roped off, so we had no option but to continue and head off the mountain on the easiest route possible, to the town below.

Looking back on it now, we still can’t believe we managed it. We have driven some hairy roads in our lives, but nothing came close to that.

You can see A little video of the drive here

After 75km, we found a parking area by the river, in the first town we came to in the valley, and collapsed into a heap of exhaustion.

It’s such a shame as we had been excited to see the vine bridges and the scarecrow village, but were totally unprepared for the roads we would need to travel to get there. If I’m honest, doing the road even in a small car would be testing, as you cannot relax for a moment, but doing it in the largest campervan you can rent in Japan is not a good idea at all.

When we picked the van up, the chap said to just make sure we stick on recognised roads, those with a number, rather than mountain roads that don’t have them. Every road we went on yesterday had a road number, so don’t be fooled that they are all OK.

After beer and food, we started to recover our sense of humour, but have decided that Shikoku isn’t good in a van like ours. The road options and park-ups are limited to the main routes and that’s not for us. So after a week here, we’ve decided to take the ferry across to Wakayama and continue exploring there.

Even with today), Shikoku has been an incredible place to visit and we’ve seen and experienced some amazing places and sites. Its certainly worth exploring, just not in a large van!