Cycling across islands while enjoying the beautiful sea and the flesh sea breeze
On your bike seat, get ready to encounter amaizing scenery you will never experience in a car seat.
If you come to Imabari, you must dig deeper to fully appreciate this town.
Tour de Tamagawa, one of the major cycling races in Imabari which started in 2014, spans from Tamagawa-cho, Onishi-cho, Kikuma-cho to Asakura. The course is full of exciting spots to see.
On this trip, we start out from Sunrise Itoyama Cycling Station, ride across Imabari City’s central area to reach Tamagawa-cho, and enjoy a short stretch of Tour de Tamagawa course and finish at Asakura. It’s a relatively hard course with lots of uphills, which would definitely give us a strong sense of accomplishment.
I suppose many cyclists coming from Onomichi would stay overnight at Sunrise Itoyama in Imabari, since it takes almost a whole day to travel down on the Shimanami Kaido. But if you're planning to go home without exploring any further, you are missing out on a lot. Make sure you have time to ride in Imabari City on the next day!
Starting from Sunrise Itoyama, we head for Ohama area on the coastal road to the east. This course has relatively less traffic and more variety of views like shipyards, fishing ports and so on. You can also see Kurushima Kaikyo Ohashi Bridge from a different angle.
Go to Sunrise Itoyama website
As we're entering the center of Imabari City, many of its local specialty foods come to my mind: Yakibuta Tamago Meshi (Roasted ham and fried egg over rice), Imabari Yakitori (Grilled chicken), shaved Ice at the super-famous shop, Tosendo, Omu-rice of Kaneto Shokudo restaurant etc. But this time, we plan to visit Imabari-jo Castle and head for Tamagawa area.
Imabari-jo is a beautiful castle built by the Daimyo Takatora Todo who governed this region and had a reputation for castle-building. It is one of the few castles in Japan where you can see a moat surrounding the castle drawing in sea water. The current tower of the castle was reconstructed in 1980 and so was the black iron gate in 2007. You can see the statue of the famed Todo in the courtyard. The stone walls and the inner moat, designated for Historic Sites of the Prefecture, have remained almost the same since the Edo period.
Go to Imabari-jo Castle's website
Now we head for Tamagawa-cho district. At the border of the district, you can find Eifuku-ji Temple, the 57th temple of the Shikoku Pilgrimage, a grand loop trail of about 1,200 kilometers, connecting 88 temples tied with a legendary Buddhist priest Kukai (774 - 835).
Eifukuji's Abbot, Missei Shirakawa, wrote a book "Boku wa Bosan (I Am a Monk)" which chronicled his life as a young monk, and the book was later made into a major feature-length film. Actually, I was cast as an extra in the film! To me, Mr. Shirakawa was much more sincere and had more grit than the character in the film.
There is a great Japanese confectionary shop "Takedaya Yawata Manju" close to the temple. The bean paste inside is made with brown sugar and every Imabari resident knows about the steamed buns. We savored them with green tea at the shop.
We had a lunch at "Sun Cafe." It is a nicely renovated old Japanese-style house serving a popular home-style lunch menu. It is one of the six restaurants that serves Tamagawa district's specialty, "Tamagawa Dam Curry." We ordered Dam Curry and lunch of the day. The lunch of the day was balanced and healthy, while the curry was also flavorful and a little bit on the spicy side with a hint of fresh fruit. The bowl containing the curry was supposed to look like the Lake of Tamagawa Dam. The curry was made of more than seven kinds of vegetables.
*Tamagawa Dam Curry is available at six restaurants in Tamagawa-cho district. If you try the dish at more than five restaurants, a gift of its original Tamagawa Dam Curry tin badge will be given.
Go to the map of Tamagawa Dam Curry
Now we head out for Nibukawa-onsen Hot Spring. It is listed as one of the best three hot springs in Ehime Prefecture, along with Dogo-onsen in Matsuyama and Hondani-onsen in Saijo City. Nibukawa is classified as an alkaline simple hot spring with the p.H. as high as 9.9. Its lotion-like water has a reputation for beautifying skin. I wish I could stretch myself and relax in the magical water but had no time for soaking in. We managed to try a foot-bath, though. The hot, thick water gradually started making me feel warm. High alkaline water also removes cuticles from the skin and makes it smooth, I've heard.
We come across the bridge called Yunohanabashi Bridge after leaving Nibukawa-onsen Hot Spring. The rarely-seen deck type Langer bridge is supported by the inversely turning arch below. At the spot a little further away from the bridge, you can go down to the valley. I think around this area is the most beautiful viewing spot in Nibukawa Valley. We keep riding towards the middle of the valley. The uphill around here is still not so steep that it's relatively easy to ride. Beyond the area of Shinrinkan, the road is getting narrower and some parts have steep uphills, but I can still manage...
After cycling on quite a long distance of uphill, we come to the fork: A road straight up and the left path which leads to Yokokurabashi Bridge. This uphill is unbelievably steep! The most perilous spot in the route of Tour de Tamagawa. The distance to the mountain pass is less than two kilometers but the uphill is so steep! Probably it is an incline of 15 degrees. In this photo, we are riding but actually pushed our bikes for quite a long time. The downhill is also incredibly steep. I could barely control my brakes!
At the end of the downhill sits the area of Kamiko no Mori. A small boar statue, or "warashishi" made with straws, welcomes us. This boar is one of the three statues built on rice fields in this area after harvesting. Local volunteers created one big adult boar and two baby ones. I was part of the team, too. Although the other two were destroyed, the baby one was moved here from the original site.
From here, we climb on another uphill. Sayano-toge Pass sits at the border of Asakura and Tamagawa. Asakura is a very quiet place. It still carries the atmosphere of the village it used to be. We only passed through it on this trip but it would be a good idea to ride slowly through this area. We celebrated the completion of our ride by having delicious sweets at Towel Museum in Asakura.
Our trip is complete here. The distance was a little over 40 kilometers, but it was a exciting course with lots of variety. To me, though, the ups and downs were a bit too much... I admit that it has given me the sense of accomplishment, too.
If you wish to return to the starting point of Sunrise Itoyama from Towel Museum, the additional distance would be a little over 20 kilometers.
