Date

2022-11-05, Saturday

Distance

47.25 km (1454.41 km in total)

I woke up at dawn and was able to behold the wide expanse of Tokachi Plain from the mountainside dressed in the golden gleam of early sunrise. There was a small amount of snow left on the grass, but nothing seemed to have seriously accumulated on the surface of the mountain pass.

I noticed a fissure on our MSR Hubba Hubba tent. For the moment I used tyre patch to do a quick repair. Can anyone tell from the picture if this fissure is serious enough that we are should replace our tent?

At 7:20 am, the owner of the restaurant that was scheduled to open at 9 am already arrived, when we were packing up our stuff. Even without seeing our tent, he knew right away that we slept under the roof last night. Instead of accusing us of trespassing, he brought us some snacks and wished us safe travel. The souvenir shop owner also let us fill up our water bottles upon our request.

We need to get over the highest point of Nissho Pass at around noon, the warmest time of the day, so we started our cycling ritual early. The roadside is marked with mentions of elevation with each increase of 60-80 m. The first 6 km which took us 47 minutes to complete brought us to the lookout area my friend was thinking of staying last night. If we had insisted on coming here in our end-of-the-day condition and snowy weather, it would have taken us nearly 2 hours! Moreover, to my friend’s dismay, the toilet she longed to use was closed for the season, and there was no water supply around. Things prove my judgement right again: never miss a good opportunity because you never know if the next one is better!

From that point onward, we were surrounded by snow-covered peaks. It’s both exciting and frightening to be exposed so directly to the wildness and the sublimity of winter elements. We needed to be doubly careful because most vehicles taking this road winding around the mountain were trucks, and there were many tunnels to pass.

After passing the highest point of the Nissho Pass (1022 m), we rode quickly though downhills into the town Hidaka where a roadside station was located. We were afraid that our symptoms would worsen if we slept in the cold weather again, so we phoned as many hotels in this town as we could find, but they were either full or closed for today. This makes us wonder if it is the ordinary reality of small Japanese town, or we are simply out of luck.

It was only 2:30 pm when we stopped biking. From Google Map, there seems to be no supply or whatsoever on this mountain road until 50 km later. We judged it would be too risky to bike further. In the end, we waited till 8 pm to set up our tent at the roadside station. Hopefully the coldest night is over.