I had scheduled two days to make my attack on Mt. Rishiri, and today was the first one of those days. The weather forecast was not favorable, however, and the forecast for tomorrow is for weaker northeasterly wind and sunny/cloudy conditions (as opposed to stronger southerly winds and showers today), so I chose to put off the hike until tomorrow. So what shall I do today? Rishiri Island is big, nearly 60 km in diameter along the shore, which to me seems like the ideal conditions to rent a scooter!
For 3,000 yen (about US$ 20), I had the use of a small Honda scooter for the day, and I enjoyed myself very much going around the island, entering fishing villages, stopping at beautiful spots, and riding up the mountain on the couple of roads that give access to the hiking paths. The foothills are covered by a luscious green forest, and the couple of small walks I took left me highly content and satisfied.
I stopped at a cove that has been used for centuries by herring fishermen, who used to dry the herring on the black basaltic rocks and sell them to the farmers for fertilizer. Presumably they still use this cove for the same purpose, but I thinking they are just putting on the style for the Japanese tourists (who surprisingly are quite numerous, even if I am the only Gaijin on the island). I saw a small knot of said Japanese tourists clustered around the cart of a baker, and for my elevenses had a couple of delicious pastries.
There were so many places where you could take a steep path to a promontory, or descend to a rocky cove, but I wanted to see it all and suspect that tomorrow will take all my stored energy to tackle the climb, so I limited myself to short walks to get to the perfect viewing spots.
Mt. Rishiri kept out of view, clad in clouds, and only once did I get a peek of its jagged summit, looming over a beautiful coastal lagoon. Looks imposing and impossibly steep!
As I crossed through the two major towns in the island I kept my eyes peeled for interesting places to visit. The best was the equivalent to a large hardware store, which surprised me by being a full service supermarket. This gave me the chance to engage in one of my favorite pastimes, which is to slowly walk the aisles, looking at all the unfamiliar food items, trying to imagine how I would cook with this or that set of ingredients. I also like to go through the home goods, the cleaning supplies, the clothes and camping supplies, and of course the hardware part of the store. The ultimate question is "Could I live in this place?", and for Japan the unequivocal answer is "Yes!"
Lunch, as is often the case when I travel, was a prepared dish from the local convenience store, which here is not Oxxo, nor 7-Eleven, but Seicomart. Unfortunately restaurants in Japan tend to hide behind opaque glass windows, so it is hard for me to (a) figure out that the shop is a restaurant, and (b) figure out if it looks tasty. In the big cities the competition leads restaurant owners to show photos of their dishes, but in small towns everybody (but me) knows what each small restaurant has to offer. Seicomart has a wide variety of hot and cold dishes, so I will not starve anytime soon.
As I walked into the hotel I was informed I had to buy a poop bag for 500 yen, to carry with me along in the hike. Call me curious but I was wondering what was inside, and all I got for my 500 yen is a double plastic bag, but no toilet paper! Fortunately I brought with me a couple of skinny rolls of double-ply Charmin, which I was able to add to the two bags. What if I had trusted the Japanese Tourist Board with my pooping well-being?
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