The Shimanami Kaido is the cycling route of the Honshu-Shikoku Bridge Expressway project connecting the cities of Onomichi (near Hiroshima) and Imabari (on Shikoku Island). A cycling road was built together with the vehicle highway bridges to form a lovely bicycle route that is around 70 km long city to city.
Shiminami Kaido Website
Getting to Onomichi
I visit Japan regularly for my work and during one work trip I decided that I would take a ride along the famed Shimanami Kaido cycle road. I cant remember how I’d heard of this route, maybe just through seeing it advertised in touristy type places? In any case, I mentioned it to my work colleague Minamoto-san, and him being a keen cyclist too was well up for taking a trip down to Onomichi over a long Saturday to take on some of the cycle road.
We discussed various methods of transport to get to Onomichi, we were travelling from Kobe area, and I had a JR Pass so could use any JR train or Shinkansen to get there) but Minamoto-san had a bike and a car and after some detailed Japanese cost comparisons from Minamoto-san he decide that although a little longer than the Shinkansen, that we would drive and take the car. This meant an early start indeed. We had gained a third member to the group as well, my work colleague Jake (to use his western name) had declared that he wanted to join us, although he had no prior cycling experience other than riding gently with his kids. Me and Jake got the Shinkansen from Shin-Kobe to Nishi-Akashi, then changed onto the local train to Tsuchiyama to meet Minamoto-san in his car.
We drove from Tsuchiyama to Onomichi along local roads and expressways, with a little stop for breakfast along the way at a service station. This was interesting, as its very much a no-frills approach on the expressway services – just some street food stalls and a vending machine ordering system for a breakfast Katsu Curry… After a couple of hours or so we had arrived in Onomichi to try and rent bikes for me and Jake and to take the start of the Shimanami Kaido.
Japan is a country that has its logistics sorted, train travel is a pleasure and the companies and authorities seem to have solutions for every little inconvenience – like people putting bikes together in non designated areas…
Once we had the car parked snd Minamoto-san’s bike built up it was time to rent a bike each for me and Jake. We tried Onomichi U2 a good cycling hub and hotel in town, however they had no spare rentals! Should have phoned ahead. We found another place called The Red Bicycles that had spare bikes, so we got fitted up and sorted with basic tools for punctures and the like.
Rolling Southbound
It was fantastic to have a bike and be rolling now, the temperature was perfect and the wind was almost non existent. Such a nice day for a bike ride. It wasn’t long before we were stopped and were awaiting a short ferry hop over the rather wide piece of water over to Mukaishima Island, where we would start proper.
As I mentioned earlier, Japan has things sorted for logistics and as far as navigating the Shimanami Kaido goes, its easy… you just follow the blue line which is painted on the road. This will take you all the way to Imabari (and vice versa). We pretty quickly caught our first sight of the impressive first bridge that we would cross, riding next to the water was great with a gentle breeze and a lovely fresh feel to the air. When we passed on this bridge we cycled underneath the road level on an integrated cycle path. Brilliant.
There were nice gentle ramps up to and off the bridge which twisted and turned in a way that you wouldn’t have been able to predict. This bridge was long and we had some great views of the islands and sea off to either side.
Now we were across the bridge we were onto Innoshima Island, we skirted the North West quarter of the island along the coast before hitting the second bridge – Ikuchi Bridge. Jake was lagging quite far behind myself and Minamoto-san and we were having to wait up for him at various points. A discussion on pace would be coming up soon, as we wanted to cover as much of the route as possible, knowing that we would have to get the rented bikes back by 18:00.
I was absolutely loving this ride. It was so peaceful and interesting with the only thing to do being to pedal and follow the blue line. We bridged onto Ikuchi island cycling along the north coast up towards the ferry port at Setoda. I really liked this section, Hiroshima prefecture is famous inside Japan for its ship building heritage, and there is a lot of evidence around of the industry in these pockets of islands.
With Jakes pace being a lot slower than ours, we discussed options for getting back to Onomichi in time for rental store closure. We cycled up to the small ferry port at Setoda and checked out the departure times for Jake to potentially head back towards Onomichi on the ferry. It was looking feasible time wise, but we decided to head back to a roadside place for some Tacoyaki (octopus balls) to then decide on the final plan.
Although slow, Jake was feeling fine after food so he decided to head back along the route we had come down. Going further south with Jake at this time (15:00 ish) would put us out of time for the rental returns, as we were planning to cycle back the way we had come. So, with Jake retracing his steps back towards Onomichi along the Blue line, Minamoto-san and I pressed on further south to cross another couple of bridges.
It seemed like the area we were riding through was known for growing lemons, I saw this giant lemon from the roadside and had to check it out. Turns out it was a bench with a nice view of the next bridge.
Onto Omishima island now and we headed south along the east coast to the bottom of the island, we were rolling at a decent pace and there was some really nice vistas along the coast. We stopped at a particularly peaceful location just to absorb the peace and quiet. We watched a fisherman for a few minutes and I loved listening to the gently lapping water against the tessellated coastal protections.
Shortly after this Minamoto-san and I arrived at the most southerly bridge of the day for us. We couldn’t keep going further due to the time constraint to get the bikes back to the rental shop. So we grabbed a photo on the south side of Omishima bridge before turning back round to drill it back up towards Onomichi. The rest of the southerly bridges and the arrival into Imabari to complete the route would have to wait for another time.
Get the bikes back before closing
We paced well heading northwards and the breeze seemed to be very nicely on our backs. We kept wondering how Jake was getting on and were assuming that he would be well on his way back to the rental store. The temperature was still ok, but the cloud cover had been getting heavier for a while. I was hoping it would lift a little bit so we could get some nice views of the sun setting.
It was great heading back in the other direction, I was spotting places I hadn’t seen on the way down. There were a couple of places where I thought – yep, that would be a nice place to live…
We got to around halfway back and it was clear that Minamoto-san needed a break, he wasn’t holding the wheel consistently and so we pulled in at a convenience store. I went in to get some snack food and Minamoto-san declined to have any, but I made him eat. By his look and feel I thought he was in danger of bonking and we didn’t need that. So with some more fuel on board we got going again.
It wasn’t long before I saw a scene that appealed to my more simplistic side. I saw some guys who, from the way they were dressed in heavy fabs gear I’d assumed to be ship builders. I imagined they had finished their work for the day and were sitting outside their sun beaten house, taking in the end of the day. There is something to be said for a hard day of working physically with metal, it reminded me of my early years in work.
The remainder of the ride was much like the rest – very good. We passed some interesting sights and I was particularly enjoying riding very close to the coast and on the ups/downs of the convoluted paths on and off the bridges. Minamoto-san had been in contact with the rental store to update the guy on our location, and the store owner had said that he would remain open for us a little longer if necessary. Very kind. We were fortunate to see pockets of cloud disperse for some rays of setting sun to get through, which certainly added to the ambience of the ride.
The rest of the ride was a dash to the finish. We had to board the ferry from Mukaishima island over to Onomichi, which was no problem and once on land again we headed to the rental store. We saw Jake hanging around outside and he had gotten his bike back around 30 minutes ahead of us, we had missed the 18:00 closing time, but we had informed the guy and he had kindly stayed open another 30 minutes for us to be able to return my bike. This kind of thing happens in Japan, where people extend kindness very easily. Jake had done well and had very much enjoyed the days ride, as had Minamoto-san. I loved it, and cant wait to head back again – hopefully as part of a bigger cycle tour of Japan?
All that was left to do was to get changed, eat some good food and then drive back up to Kobe area to wrap up an excellent day.
