I already summarised our Japan trip, but did not even wrap up the last days properly. As we rode the final 17km, from Sapporo centre to our warm showers home, it became entirely clear that these were the very last kms of our fantastic journey... We enjoyed it and arrived at the Ikeda house with a final count of 11.195kms. When we left Malaysia almost 8 months ago, I thought we'd probably do around 10 to 12k, and yes we ended right between that.
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Our warm showers home, at Kenichi and Nazumi Ikeda's place
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| A nice gadget inside their house: a constant display of power used by the household versus generated by their solar panels, and the nett result. |
We were very warmly welcomed at Kenichi and Nazumi's place, a nice house a little outside Sapporo. They are lovely people, and made sure our stay with them was incredible - really setting the standard of excellent hosting... Nazumi cooked delicious lunch and dinners, and even made fresh bread (hand made!) for breakfast! It was so nice and good fun to talk about our bicycle trip, and hear their stories - Kenichi himself cycled for 4 (FOUR) years around the world, some years ago. On Thursday we started the day by preparing for the trip home. Re-pack our panniers and take some stuff out that wouldn't come back with us - things like the gas canister which you can't take on a plane, or some things that were so worn that they just really belonged in the bin. Then it was bicycle packing time. We had bought 2 bicycle bags while cycling through Hokkaido, to be able to take a train if we wanted/needed but also because that would be most convenient to travel back. We were flying AirAsia, where you just pay a reasonable excess fee for bicycles but there are no strong requirements on how to pack them. Still the bicycles needed quite a bit of disassembly and protection, as we wanted them to get back home safely of course! It all went very smoothly - after 8 months you kinda know the different bolts and screws - and by noon it was all done.
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| Taking it all apart and then putting it safely inside the bag like a puzzle |
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| Packed and loaded into the car, ready to go |
So after a wonderful lunch made by Nazumi, we went for a walk to the nearby Hokkaido open air museum, a nice collection of historic old houses in a park (for the Belgians: a bit like Bokrijk really). Another nice dinner with a few glasses of wine to celebrate (and grieve) the end of our trip, a slightly short night, and we were on our way home. Kenichi brought us to the train station in the morning, we took the train without any problem (but heavy packs), arrived at the airport, and checked in. It was all as easy as that. It was all so strange, also while on the plane: such a whirlpool of different feelings and thoughts - pride, happiness, eagerness, sadness, even a bit of doubts and anxiety, and so on... It had been great, suddenly it was all over, but hooray we're going home! Even back in KL, it all felt so familiar, as if we had hardly been away, while we had had such a great journey and adventure...
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| At the open air museum |
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| An old newspaper printing office, with an impressive array of printing stamps with Japanese symbols |
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| We really adore these traditional Japanese interiors |
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| Delicious dinner with Ken and Nazumi; she had very appropriately prepared fresh sushi for our last Japanese dinner! |
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| Hmmmmmmm |
This kind of mixed feelings continued once we were home. It was fantastic to come home, see our good friends Jochen & Sofie who had been following our trip from very nearby, and Lal who happened to be in KL too, and enjoy that BBQ. To sleep in our own bed. To have fresh bread for breakfast, and roti for lunch. To relax at the pool and even go for a hash run on Sunday, see so many of our friends we missed for so long, and of course Vere who is home during her semester break! So many great things back home... Still, at the same time, I think we'd very happily leave again soon, to add more kms, more experiences, more countries, people and adventures. Reality calls of course, and in about a week from now I'll be at work again. This will surely take some time to get used to again as well...
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| At the airport, last check |
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| Going home, it's real... |
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| And safe arrival at home! |
I guess this is it for the real trip updates; I still have a few related blogposts I'd like to do, so stay tuned! And who knows, soon there might be other interesting topics to add!?