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.
The Yumeshima Kaido is a road and bridge network that will eventually connect all four islands located on the east side of Innoshima and Ikuchijima islands. Those four islands are Iwagijima, Ikinajima, Sashima and Yugeshima, and three islands except for Iwagijima are already connected. Iwagi Hashi Bridge that connects Iwagijima and Ikinajima islands is scheduled to open in 2021. Unlike the Shimanami Kaido, it’s a short cycling course best suited for a leisurely ride.
As the Yumeshima Kaido has no land route nor bridge access from the Shimanami Kaido, or other inland areas, we had to take a ferry. There were some ocean routes to choose from, and on this trip, we opted for a ferry from Habu-ko Port in Innnoshima Island leaving for Ikinajima Island.
The time table is here
We could ride from either Onomichi or Imabari, but it wouldn't leave us much time to enjoy our ride on the Yumeshima Kaido. In my opinion, it would be best to take your bike on a car, or take a bus with a bicycle carrier.
Access to Habu-ko Port is here
We could see Ikinajima Island so close from Habu-ko Port in Innoshima Island that I felt like we could almost swim there. We parked our car at Habu-ko Port and took the ferry (The parking fee is 1,330 yen for 8 hours). Make sure to print out "Kamijima Cycle Free Ticket" from the official Kamijima-cho website which makes the bicycle freight free of charge.
A couple of minutes ferry ride took us to Tateishi-ko Port in Ikinajima Island.
From Tateishi-ko Port in Ikinajima Island, we head for Ikina Hashi Bridge which links to Sashima Island. A ramp leading up to Ikina Hashi Bridge soon takes us up to the bridge. It’s safer to ride on the right side, since the rather narrow road has no side strip on its left side. As bridges of the Yumeshima Kaido were built much smaller and lower than the Shimanami Kaido, the views are strikingly different.
Soon after we landed on Sashima Island, we are back on a bridge again, Yuge Ohashi, this time. In our plan, we're going to cut across Sashima Island to get to Yugeshima Island to cycle around first. The ocean looks so close that we do feel like we're cycling between islands. The cycling course itself is also so short that it seems like a mini-version of the Shimanami Kaido.
We landed on Yugeshima Island. Yugeshima is slightly larger than Iwagijima Island, and the largest of the four. Living in Imabari City, when I hear "Yugeshima," National Institute of Technology, or Yuge Shosen College, comes to mind right away. It is a college to acquire necessary skills to become a captain or an engineer on vessels, and completing the course requires five years. After graduating from junior highschool, some of my classmates went to the college. I sincerely admired their courage and perseverance to live in a dorm in a small and remote island at such a young age. Now that we have the Shimanami Kaido, Yugeshima feels much closer.
Passing under Yugeohashi Bridge we just got off, we take the route clockwise. Here comes a limestone mountain ahead of us.
We are at Shimade Cafe which also functions as "Cycle Oasis," a rest stop for cyclists. Apparently it serves lunch using Lemon Pork (lemon-fed-pork) and fresh local fish, but unfortunately, we don’t have time on this trip. We’ll come back next time.
The neighboring log house is a souvenir shop which carries a variety of local specialty food. As Yugeshima is known for producing Nori, or dried seaweed, we see a lot of Nori products at the shop.
A few hundred meters ahead is Yuge-ko Port, where you can take a rapid ferry to/from Imabari. You can take your bicycle on this ferry.
See Access here
Yugeshima is known for its salt manor and then-Prince, Emperor Akihito, visited here when he was attending Gakushuin University in 1981. Both Yuge-ko Port and Kamiyuge-ko Port vicinities are the main residential areas where quaint settlements still remain. From Kuji-ko Port near there, we head out for the eastern coast of Yugeshima Island.
Without the small signpost which reads that here starts the cycling course, we could easily overlook its starting point. To make things more challenging, the route is so narrow and starts with a steep uphill. For a while, we were unsure about whether we were on the right path or not, but it seems like we are! The long stretch of continuous ups and downs reminds us of grueling Suigun Skyline of Innnoshima Island. It’s so hard! But the view is incredible! It pushes us forward.
We are almost getting back to Shimoyuge, where we started at. We could see Yuge Ohashi Bridge, too! It means that we completed the cycling route that goes around the northern coast of Yugeshima Island. Now we are back in Shimoyuge area. Looking to the east, we can see the beautiful view of pine trees on Houougahara Beach. Even in the Seto Inland Sea, beaches covered with white sand are disappearing so fast. It’s getting rare to see a long stretch of white-sanded beach like this.