(The following entry is from my paper diary, hence the quotation marks. Comments may follow at the end. These are written after the completion of the trip.)
Day 4. Monday, July 19, 2010. Lake Akan to Karikachi Pass northwest of Obihiro.
"Rain on the tent at 3:30, light, but not welcome. I didn't leave the campground till 5:20. Moved everything, including the tent, to a shelter 10 meters away where I packed everything partly wet. The extra ground pad the manager gave me came in handy as my sleeping bag stayed dry.
Ate something quickly and headed uphill. Strange, but going uphill wasn't as bad as I feared. However, on reaching the junction of the Obihiro road I dismounted and walked most of the way up the pass. Took a picture standing in front of the sign. I think it read "Ashoro Pass". Roughly the same elevation as the pass to Akan-ko yesterday. The ride down on the "Ashoro National Highway" was easy.
Removed my rain gear in front of a gas station and shop at the junction of 241 (Ashoro National Highway) and Rte. 143.
Stopped for a lunch of natto, a small salami, coffeemilk and 6-slice bread at the "michi-no-eki" in central Ashoro. The facility was brand new. It was interesting that I attracted the attention of only 1 traveler whom I could barely understand. Saw one teenage boy with his parents and wondered if he really enjoyed traveling with them.
Left Ashoro on 241 and hit an upgrade right away. Rode up maybe 1 km. then walked the rest.
My first big waymark was the Shihoro area about 35 km. from Obihiro. Here I had to decide to go into central Obihiro as originally planned and find a hotel or cut across the plain north of Obihiro and try to reach the youth hostel in Sahoro near the Karikachi Pass.
At Kamishihoro I left 241 and cut diagonally southwest using Google map and got on Rte. 274, the "Nissho Toge National Highway". It was into the afternoon by now and I headed into a continual headwind along a road that was dead straight for at least 20 km. - a rarity so far. I was nearly out of anything to drink when I hit a rest stop. Called home and talked to Selena from there. I considered stopping there overnight as it had vending machines, water and a modern toilet with a relatively neutral smelling entry - in case I needed to sleep indoors.
I rejected this location for an overnight as I wanted to place myself as close to Furano as possible for the next day's ride. Accordingly, I googled in "Sahoro" again for the shortest way to the Y.H. It appeared to be in the pass itself. I should have studied the YH guide book map more carefully and input "Shintoku" station as my end point. The hostel is actually at the foot of the pass while I joined Rte. 38 (the pass road) several kilometers uphill from it. Thinking that I had just a few kilometers to go, even with the time close to 7 p.m., I continued uphill - walking mostly.
Ironically, I passed the entrance to Hokkaido's (and maybe Japan's) only Club Med. As darkness fell I began wondering just where this little station-side settlement was. I should be spotting a Seicomart shortly, but the road just climbed and curved. The curves were illuminated rather well with mercury-vapor lights and the white line marked by overhead lights. At one point I heard an animal moving parallel with me and downhill. It made a rather high pitched sound. I dreaded the thought of having to turn the bicycle around and out-racing whatever it was by going downhill.
Finally, after rounding one more curve and seeing nothing, I decided it was better to set up the tent and spend the night. There was light rain off and on but the wind gusts were terrible. I was afraid one of them might actually take the rain-fly away. I left most of the bags outside as they are supposed to be waterproof if closed properly. However, as I did have some food in one of them, I had visions of some animal gnawing its way in to reach it. Though I had sweated much, I was comfortably warm in the sleeping bag and may have dozed off between the biggest gusts. I could hear them coming up the mountain. There were still a few cars and trucks passing. I was hoping that some sort of highway patrol vehicle might stop, but I was without luck.
At about 11:30 I woke abruptly as something was definitely tapping on the tent. I heard nothing - certainly no heavy breathing as I imagined a bear might make. I hissed and the tapping stopped. It returned a bit later. This time, silhouetted by the road light across the way (I pitched the tent on the inside of the curve.) was a fox - ears clearly standing out. I got out of the tent and there it was just 2 meters from me. It then slowly walked off.
I woke up at 3:30 and started packing as fast as I could. The fox appeared one more time and I got its picture. One more thing: before 8 (NB: 8 p.m., the evening of the 19th)and pitching the tent I wanted to call the hostel to see if they could help me navigate. I stopped near a sign marking the distance to Takikawa as 121 km. Unfortunately, my iPhone wouldn't connect me and my cellphone's battery was completely drained!
Total distance this day: 147 km."
(October 2, 2010. Recalling the 19th now, two and a half months later, I realize that I should have stuck to my original plan to stay in the city of Obihiro. The ride in mid-afternoon west along Rte. 274 was a slow, energy-draining one in the wind. In addition, there were no stores to buy anything for at least 20 kilometers. After deciding to make for the youth hostel, I input part of the mailing address for the hostel instead of the name of the nearby train station. Google will almost always return the location of a train station. If I had done so, I wouldn't have intersected Rte. 38 well into the pass a number of kilometers above the hostel. And did I expect to find a train station on the side of a mountain? I had once encountered a station in Fukushima Prefecture which served a train line that actually climbed part way up a mountain on a series of switchbacks. This goes to show that if you want something to exist badly enough, you'll create it using the slenderest of precedents. It would soon be dark and I wanted that town to be there!
After I discovered the fox outside the tent I fell asleep - lost consciousness might be more accurate - but woke some time later thinking, or imagining, that something was outside the tent. Groggy, I peered through the screen window in the rear of the tent and thought I was looking at the face of a gray-faced bear. I closed my eyes and looked once more to see nothing. Morning couldn't come fast enough!)
A more detailed time line:
5:20 am., left campground in Lake Akan
6:25, at Ashoro Pass on Rte. 241
10:45, in Ashoro
7:45 pm., stopped for the night on grade up to Karakachi Pass
11:30, visited by fox
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