October 4, 2025
Day 32 — Osaki to Obanazawa
So this was the day we planned to jiggy-jog back west after our jiggy-jog east to see the Buddhist sites in Hiraizumi. We had perused the map and the route between Osaki and Obanazawa seemed to offer the least painful up and over between river valleys. We had spend some time in Ichinoseki route planning, and had concluded we did indeed want to be further west as there was likely more to see and less risk of getting stuck on awful highways with interurban trucks on them. The trade off would likely be more hills, but we’d prefer climbing over traffic.
Anyway, not a huge amount to report from this day. The ride in the morning was through flat agricultural land. It was warm and steamy, making us feel like we were indeed making progress south, though perhaps it was just unseasonably warm and we were kidding ourselves.
The flat agricultural route then morphed into a narrow two lane road through a seemingly endless small town with houses and shops pressed right up to the roadway. Though the road was very narrow, the traffic was almost entirely teeny tiny passenger vehicles going 40 km/hr, so it was pretty easy to tolerate. Plus chugging along past homes and shops was pretty interesting.
As Marilee mentioned in the last post, we’ve been noticing that in Honshu, and increasingly as we’ve been getting further south, that there are more older buildings that remain standing and that have been kept up. In addition, newer buildings seem to have incorporated more traditional designs. Certainly makes for more interesting riding. In addition, we’ve been seeing a LOT more temples and shrines than in Hokkaido. Small shrines dot the landscape, with the occasional larger temple popping up during the ride. We did stop for one larger temple this morning — a good excuse for a quick break to look around.
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The flat agricultural / townsite eventually turned uphill. And it turned out the road was pretty good! No bad traffic, mostly ones and twos of passenger vehicles, and the climb was fairly modest. After a brief bit of climbing we came to a roadside lunch stop run by a couple of older women, patronized by what seem like regular passersby. We had cold soba noodles for the first time on this trip, which were both refreshing and filling, and set us up well for the rest of the afternoon’s climb and descent.
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We were back to camping again this evening. The autocamp was quite full, but had room for us in the “free” (no parking spot, it still cost ¥) area. It was very well appointed, and had a nice onsen nearby, but the most expensive yet at ¥3000. Given hotels with breakfast buffets can be had for $50-70, you can see how the calculus for camping is less attractive, much as we enjoy it.
Today's ride: 65 km (40 miles)
Total: 1,652 km (1,026 miles)
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