During this segment we got introduced to our first 4 cycling days on the island of Hokkaido. We succeeded in overcoming our initial stress associated with our inability to secure accommodations in many of the small towns where we scheduled to rest in. With perseverance in surveying Google Maps, we managed to find and reserve all of our outstanding accommodations using a combination of online tools namely: a popular Japanese hotel booking site, individual accommodation websites and obviously Booking.com and Hotels.com. While dealing with the various online forms, I learned to convert my name to Katakana (ギllエs Lアlオンデ), Hiragana (ぎllえs Lあlおんで), Furigana(ジル・ラロンド). We also revised once again our itinerary to reduce our cycling days after leaving the island of Hokkaido. Hence, we opted to book a ferry service that would bring us to Tokyo within 2 cycling days – rather than our initial ferry choice which would have entailed another 10 cycling days. Finally, we also purchased our airfare from Tokyo to Shanghai (July 23rd) where we will spend 12 days before flying back home on August 5th with Air Canada. Our strategy for dealing with the tandem entailed stopping our cycling journey on July 14th nearby the Narita Airport – Tokyo’s main airport (~70-80kms away from the city downtown). There, we planned to tear-down, box-up and leave the tandem at the hotel we have reserved. We would then take the train into the heart of Tokyo for a 5-day sightseeing visit before returning to our Narita-based hotel for our flight to Shanghai. We’ll be greeted and picked-up at the Shanghai Pudong airport by family members.

2024.06.20 – [JP] Ferry to Otaru ==> Otaru (2 kms | Total: 1903 kms)

The previous evening we left our hotel at 10:15pm and cycled 1.5 kms to the ferry terminal. We were surprised to see all the cars already lined up in the parking lot. We completed our registration at the ferry check-in desk with no english speaking staff. Jenny had to board the ferry as a regular foot passenger while I stayed outside with the tandem. The vehicle boarding process was slower than anticipated. I eventually joined the line-up of motorcycles for boarding and then was asked to push the bicycle up to the 2nd level ramp. Jenny waited for a long time until I showed up to our private inside cabin. We both had a good night sleep with the light rolling motion of the ship. In the morning, we explored the facilities of the ferry’s three decks before eating breakfast staples in our room. We rested and caught up on more sleep until mid-afternoon. Later, we had some ice cream and coffee at the snack bar while enjoying the view of the sea. For dinner, we went to the ship’s mid-range restaurant. We arrived at the port of Otaru at 8:45pm – as expected. Thankfully, Jenny and I were able to walk off the ferry among the first of handful of vehicles. We managed to find our accommodation after cycling a short 1.5kms distance. Initially, we struggled to find the lock box holding the key to our accommodation’s front door as we were trying to access the door on the other side of the house. Once we managed to gain access to the accommodation, we were quite pleased by our spacious, modern and new room. After a good shower, we were eager for a good night sleep.

2024.06.21 – [JP] Otaru ==> Otaru (0 kms | Total: 1903 kms)

We had a lazy morning in bed. We visited a nearby local fast food for breakfast. We quite enjoyed the food and especially the cheap coffee offering. Back at our room, Jenny did some clothes hand washing. As we were leaving Maizuru for our ferry ride, we learned of another ferry service from Hokkaido back to the Honshũ that could bring us closer to Tokyo. Hence, this option would further shorten our itinerary by 8 cycling days. Jenny and I were quite agreeable to this scenario. Later we spent a fair bit of the time reviewing our travel itinerary while trying to book as many accommodations as we could for the remainder of our trip. In the afternoon, we joined a large stream of tourist sightseers along Otaru’s main street. We walked the length of the town’s canal – one of the main tourist attraction. In the evening, we visited a nearby Chinese restaurant with good food and great value. We walked around 10kms throughout our sightseeing day.

2024.06.22 – [JP] Otaru ==> Otaru (0 kms | Total: 1903 kms)

Before heading out for breakfast at the same restaurant as yesterday, we booked our one-way airfare from Tokyo to Shanghai (July 23rd) and also our one-way airfare from Shanghai to Ottawa (Aug. 5th). From our breakfast restaurant, we continued to walk towards a shopping mall. There we purchased some batteries for the tandem rear light as well as some hand towels. Back in our room, we rested until mid-afternoon. We stepped out again to visit one of the museums on the tourist strip. We learned that all the blown stained glass craft showcased more than a dozen of souvenir/art shops were imported from Venice (Murano). The town of Otaru promoted its tourism as being inspired by Venice. In the evening, we walked over to a further neighborhood for our dinner at a nice upscale (for us) Japanese restaurant. We covered another 13 kms during our day’s exploration.

2024.06.23 – [JP] Otaru ==> Sapporo (37 kms | Total: 1940 kms)

We returned for one last breakfast at our favorite place. We checked-out of our home stay at 10am. We easily cycled out of town but we quickly got to climb a manageable slope for 6 or 7 kms. We alternated our cycling between the street shoulder and the sidewalk. As we got closer to Sapporo (a city of 2 millions people), we encountered more vehicle traffic but we were more annoyed by the many red traffic lights. We arrived at our hotel shortly after 1:30pm. As the official check-in only started at 3pm, we left our luggage at the reception and went out for some sightseeing. The city was bustling with visitors. We walked the full length (1.5kms) of the beautiful Odõri Park. Although it was not an official festival, there appeared to be a flower competitions of some sort. We initially thought this floral was the reason the hotel prices tripled on Saturday night but it appeared like a typical pattern as we checked a few other Saturday’s night hotel prices and they were also heavily inflated. We also visited the Hokkaidõ University Botanical Garden. On our way back to our hotel, we stopped at a popular bakery for some pastries and a good rest. Back at the hotel, we finally checked into our room at 5:00pm. After showering, we went out for dinner at a ramen restaurant – Sapporo’s signature dish. We walked around 13 kms after the cycling day.

2024.06.24 – [JP] Sapporo ==> Sapporo (0 kms | Total: 1940 kms)

As the weather forecast called for some light rain, we had planned to visit the famous Sapporo Beer Museum but we learned that it was closed today – as most museums in town were closed on Monday. After our relaxing hotel breakfast, we spent a few hours attempting to reserve more hotels for our Hokkaido cycling loop. We were clearly not keen on camping along the way. We had to revert to use a combination of local Japanese hotel booking online site, specific hotel site and Booking.com. With perseverance, we managed to secure 8 out of our 9 outstanding accommodation gaps in Hokkaido. In the afternoon, we borrowed an umbrella from the hotel reception and walked over to the Nakajima Park for a long stroll. On our way back to the hotel, we had expected to stop for some soft ice cream but we gave up as we could not find a good value offering. In the evening, we had our dinner at a Gusto – a family restaurant. We walked around 10kms for sightseeing.

2024.06.25 – [JP] Sapporo ==> Iwamizawa (44 kms | Total: 1984 kms)

We had yet another satisfying hotel breakfast before loading the tandem and leaving our hotel behind. It seemed always a bit more challenging to get back on the saddle after a relaxing stay as we had in Sapporo. It was much easier leaving town this morning than it was entering the urban core on the previous Sunday. The cycling was quite easy as the road was mostly flat and we had a wide shoulder to ride on. As we arrived around 1:00pm in the outskirt of our destination town, we stopped at a McDonald’s for coffee and some snacks in order to delay of arrival at the hotel. As we showed up at 2pm at our small hotel, we were delighted when the owner allowed us to check into our rooms. As we encountered some difficulty finding available accommodation in this town, we had to revert to book two separate rooms. Thankfully, our rooms were side-by-side but sadly they both had smell of cigarette. To our great surprise, many Japanese hotels still offer smoking rooms to their guests. In the evening, we had our dinner at an Sukiya restaurant outlet – the same restaurant chain we had our breakfast during our stay in Otaru.

2024.06.26 – [JP] Iwamizawa ==> Takikawa (46 kms | Total: 2029 kms)

After returning from dinner last night and before walking into our respective hotel rooms, we had agreed to meet up at 8:10am in order to cycle back to Sukiya for breakfast. When we returned to our room after our breakfast, we discovered the hotel’s cleaning staff had already made up our rooms. We were not very pleased with this event. We finally left our hotel by 9:40am. We cycled most of the time along the major road’s shoulder. Along the way, we stopped at a “michi no eki” – Japan’s popular and widespread roadside stations – for a washroom break and later we enjoyed a tasty soft ice cream cone. We managed again to check-in to our hotel room before 2:00pm. Our tandem was invited in the building for its night rest. Our room was more comfortable than yesterday but we could still smell a lingering smell of smoke – the ash tray in the room was also a convincing factor. We were offered coins for a welcome drinks which we self-served from a vending machine. In the evening, we walked over to a Chinese restaurant but it was closed. We reverted to another nearby Japanese restaurant instead.

2024.06.27 – [JP] Takikawa ==> Asahikawa (63 kms | Total: 2092 kms)

We opted to repeat our breakfast routine from yesterday before leaving town. We cycled half the time along the highway shoulder and the other half on pleasant bicycle paths. Although our route’s elevation profile suggested that we would be gently climbing all day, we did not find it difficult. As we arrived in town, we stopped at a large grocery store for snacks and evening meal staples. Our hotel, just nearby, allowed us to check into our room when we showed up at 2:30pm. After a well-deserved shower, we did some clothes washing at the hotel laundromat. We had dinner in our room and relaxed for the remainder of the evening.

2024.06.28 – [JP] Asahikawa ==> Asahikawa (0 kms | Total: 2092 kms)

In the early morning, we followed Victoria’s flight arrival into Montreal from London (UK) and later her train ride back to Ottawa. Our good friend Gang kindly picked her up from the train station. We skipped the hotel’s paid breakfast in lieu of some breakfast staples we picked up at the nearby grocery store. We targeted four sites for our sightseeing visit: Asahikawa Kitasaito Garden, Otokoyama Sake Brewing Museum, Tokiwa Park and Heiwa dōri Shopping Street. Of these sites, the Sake Museum was clearly the highlight of our sightseeing. We had to take the city bus to reach the museum but it was well worth it. The museum’s main draw for visitors was their free sake tasting samples. Before returning to our room for our mid-afternoon rest, we stopped at the food court of the nearby shopping mall for some soft ice cream, coffee and fries. In the evening, we attempted to visit a popular ramen restaurant as it was one of the highly regarded dish of this town. Unfortunately, the restaurant was closed. Instead, we had dinner in the food court of the shopping mall. We covered over 13 kms during our day’s sightseeing.