Slightly cooler night, may have managed some sleep – but still didn’t need to get my sleeping bag out for the first time in Japan.

Bit of company packing up.

An easy, flat day of coastal riding to the northern most city, Wakkanai, awaited us. A lot of dairy farms, but very few cows seen. Animals inside most of the year, grass taken to them from the fields – mostly seemed to be hay. We got quite excited if we spied any cows outside.

Open fields, no muck or fences.

Cows in there somewhere.

Easy smooth riding very much assisted by a tailwind.

Occasionally we stopped at quiet fishing harbours for a bit of shade and a drink machine, interesting to see various items laid out readying for the next catch.

Pictorial signs continue to amuse, if not entirely inform us.

Even more coastal protection being made and set. In places it seemed a lot of concrete being used to protect open fields.

One of the bigger wind farms we saw; a bit like the solar farms, wind turbines were generally in small groups and spread around northern Hokkaido.

Had to stop for a photo as we crossed the 45th parallel.

Quite the change from the coastal landscape that requires long tunnels.

Always more snacks to try – these were good, but I wasn’t sure how well they’d survive in the heat; well, that was my excuse for eating them quickly.

Largest hill all day, all of fifty metres to get over to Wakkanai on the other coast (as Hokkaido narrows in the north). Different style of wind turbine.

We found our first rider house (basic accommodation for motor cyclists and bicyclists). It was an experience, run by a chain-smoking eighty-odd year old woman, the fug of cigarette smoke pervaded. Our windowless bunk room was overwhelmingly damp and musty. But there was an onsen next door, with a bar and kitchen – a much nicer place to hang out, with some live music too. Enough daylight left for a bit of wandering; on the northern extent of the island and no doubt exposed to a lot of weather the town had a harder edge to it than others we’d seen.

The deer didn’t seem to mind though.

Typical community police station.

A third language on the street signs here – Sakhalin Island (Russia) being so close, there’s been some cross-settlement over the years.

Cute mini-trucks make for even cuter mini-campers.

Rest day tomorrow as a lot of rain forecast. After a week of little sleep in the heat, I was looking forward to it. I certainly didn’t have the energy or patience for enforced-fun in a foreign language at the stale rider house – I skipped the late “compulsory” round table of introductions and singing some song about Hokkaido and went to bed.