to nowhere in particular

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to nowhere in particular Viajero
hiroshima
7–9 sept. 2024, Japón ⋅ ☁️ 33 °C
japan is the goofiest country on earth. i got that sense right from the moment i stepped out onto the street for the first time. i can't really put my finger on it, but everything you see there just seems kind of funny. that said, i was really excited to explore the country. the first day, i just took a nap, talked to some people in the common room and made use of the guitar they had there. i'm still determined to get back into it and i try to use the opportunity whenever a hostel has one laying around.

the next day, i rented a cheap bike from the hostel and drove two hours to a nearby cultural heritage island, getting a good sunburn in on the way. after a bit of trouble with finding an atm, i took a ferry over expecting not much more than some nice nature with one or two shinto shrines dotted throughout, but it turned out to be one of the coolest places i would come to visit in japan with pristine historical building complexes, great scenery and most of all, hundreds of deer just strolling about getting food in return for pets.

it took a while to get to this point, so i only had about an hour to sunset, but i made the best of it, getting away from the crowds way and into the hillside, where i took a walk and got some great pics before returning to the mainland.

back on my bicycle on the way home, i even encountered the local fixie bike scene. seeing how extremely obedient the japanese are with traffic laws, especially crosswalks, it was cool to see at least this one guy swerving through the traffic. i kept up with him for a while, but then my handlebar practically fell off.

if it weren't for the time pressure, i probably would've stayed a day or two longer, but i was already out the door the next morning to hitch a ride on the highway.Leer más
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Vor allem unterwegsHi Joni, schön von dir zu hören. Dich hat auch das Japan Fieber gepackt?😊
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to nowhere in particular Viajero
highway rest stop
9–10 sept. 2024, Japón ⋅ ☁️ 29 °C
hitchhiking in japan is tricky. your best chance for a ride is hitching one at a highway rest stop, so i took a train to the outskirts of hiroshima, bought some food and walked a while until i found a flight of stairs leading up the highway. i was already completely sweat through when i got there, thinking i would be in a climatized car soon, but this time, i wasn't as lucky.

i stood in the scorching heat for almost two hours and had to take a break in order not to pass out. i then followed the advice from an online blog and tried to talk to people coming out of the store directly, but that didn't work either. after half an hour more of standing by the highway exit, i was finally picked up and dropped off at another rest stop one or two hundred kilometres further.

it was getting late, so i had already scouted out my place to set up camp for the night when i figured i could stick my thumb out for a couple more minutes. to my surprise, it paid off big time, because a young guy in a camaro stopped for me and agreed to take me with him, and into the sunset we went. i actually fell asleep from exhaustion in the car, but woke up when he pulled over for a break.

i took a breather outside and discovered that the rest stop actually had a perfect grassy area, quiet, dark and conceiled, so i decided to say farewell to the guy and stay there for the night. finally after a long, long time, i got to have one of my beloved "in-the-tent-watching-a-good-movie"-evenings again.

the next morning, i got myself two sandwiches and got right back at it. this time, i found a piece of paper and made a little sign to help me. luckily, it didn't take long for a small truck to pull over, and after a quick pit stop in the driver's home village, we finally rolled into osaka.Leer más
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to nowhere in particular Viajero
osaka
11–13 sept. 2024, Japón ⋅ ☁️ 33 °C
the hostel i went to in osaka was a recommendation from a friend, apparently the only good social hostel in japan, but it didn't really catch me that much when i was there. did a little city touring anyways and used some time to plan my next steps.

i also got the craziest haircut of my life there. 5 people working on me like a manufacturing line, not only cutting my hair, but shaving, massaging, shampooing, trimming my eyebrows, plucking nose hairs and everything. walked out like a new man.Leer más
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to nowhere in particular Viajero
toyota
13–14 sept. 2024, Japón ⋅ 🌙 26 °C
my next stop was kyoto. i didn't have motivation or time to stay there for longer, but i at least wanted to see the bamboo forest, so i decided to take a train there and then start hitchhiking from the outskirts of the city.

the area surrounding the bamboo walkway was stuffed with thousands of other sweaty tourists, but i still managed to get one or two decent pictures. i cooled off over a freezer box in a 7-11 and then made my way to the metro to get to the hitchhiking spot i had scouted out. i had to walk through the heat for another little while and then jump a fence to get into the rest stop, found some cardboard, made a sign that just said "east" and started hitchhiking. a couple of sri lankans picked me up and dropped me off at a train station in the outskirts of nagoya.

since i only had half the day for hitchhiking, it was already dark and i didn't have a place to sleep, so i scowered google maps for a while until i found a suitable public park an hours train ride away in toyota. what i didn't know was that this was actually *the* toyota, so i was quite surprised when i had to find out that half the city was a manufacturing plant without public access. i had to walk a bit longer than planned, but eventually made it to the park and went to sleep.Leer más
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to nowhere in particular Viajero
fujiyoshida
14–15 sept. 2024, Japón ⋅ ⛅ 23 °C
next goal: mount fuji. i awoke to some seniors doing morning gymnastics in front of my tent in the park, packed up, and started walking to the next town to catch the only bus that could take me back to the highway. after an hour, i arrived and found the bus stop after some struggle (i didn't buy a sim card in japan, so all i usually had were presaved maps and a couple of screenshots).

another half hour of walking later, i made it to the rest stop, but it was particularly well fenced off, so i had to fight through some fauna until finally found a way in. i freshened up in the bathroom, bought some food and got to work. after a while, a guy picked me up, but he was pretty bizarre. he spoke good english because he used to play in an orchestra in chicago, but not even five minutes after i got in, he started going on about his ex girlfriend that had dumped him half a year back. fair enough, i get that sometimes people just pick me up because they need somebody to open up to, but this guy did not stop rambling and had her songs (she was a singer) running the entire time while chainsmoking. most of all, i remember i couldn't even feel any warmth coming from his fingers when we shook hands at the end. poor guy really.

while walking around looking for something to make a sign out of (i didn't need to go east any further), i found a service entrance behind the rest stop filled floor to ceiling with cardboard. heaven is a place in japan. i asked the guy working there if i could take one, and he turned out to be a real cardboard connoisseur. now equipped with the best hitchhiking sign i ever had, i went to work.

this time took a bit longer, and after a while i was kicked off by one of the parking aids because he was concerned about me standing too close to the passing cars. found another spot and finally got a ride with a young couple that was going the right way. i had planned to go to kofu, where a cheap guesthouse would've been my base for a trip to the second and third highest mountains in japan, followed by fuji, the highest one. but since these guys were going to fujiyoshida, the town right at the foot of fuji, i scrapped those plans and just came with them.

after being dropped off just at sunset, i used the rest of the day to do some research with the station wifi until they kicked me out. i found a tiny weather window in the morning hours of the third day to come, so i would have to leave right the next morning. there were a thousand factors and scenarios to consider, but at the end of the day, i had three days worth of calorie dense food, a new aa-battery powered powerbank, half my stuff locked away in the train station lockers, a head full of maps and plans, and a tent next to the trailhead.Leer más
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to nowhere in particular Viajero
climbing fuji #1
15–16 sept. 2024, Japón ⋅ ⛅ 20 °C
after a last pit stop at the train station for hygiene and wifi purposes, it was go time. i'll give some context first: there are three trails leading up to the summit of fuji, the one was going to take was the yoshida trail that has been walked by monks for centuries. it's also the most popular trail in the on season, but i missed (or rather avoided) that by a couple of days, so officially, the trail, along with all water, food and shelter service along the way, would be closed.

the mountain is segmented into 10 stages from bottom to top, with the fifth station being the last one reachable by road and subsequently a tourist attraction and start point of summit pushes. i was going all the way from the bottom though, so i would have to sleep on the mountain. my plan went as follows: hike up to 5th station, find a sheltered sleeping spot there once the tourists leave, summit the next day and use the emergency shelter located on 8th station, then walk all the way back down the next day. that way, i could hit the summit window while even being able to leave my tent at the bottom.

just to be sure, i went to the tourist info that morning. the lady told me that the trail was fully closed off with no way to summit, i could not refill water at 5th station, and i wouldn't be able to make it there anyway because it was already too late. i chose to respectfully ignore everything she said and give it a try anyways - and went on to discover that everything she had told me was wrong.

the start of the trail could've well been a german forest with a barely noticable slope, but it got steeper and steeper the further i went along the trail. apart from a couple of runners, i didn't see more than a dozen hikers that day. knowing that 300.000 people hike fuji every year, i didn't know whether to see that as a good or bad sign, but it was certainly great to have some quiet time after all those days on the highway. the thick forest made the heat somewhat bearable, so i was right in my element and smashed the 15kms up to 2300 meters in less than four instead of six hours. when i got to the observation deck on fifth station, i was of course greeted not only by hundreds of tourists, but a bunch of stores as well. shoutout to the info lady for making me carry 3 kilos of extra water up that mountain.

now for the hard part: finding a sleeping spot. there was a bunch of security at the 5th station, making it impossible to sleep there, so i backtracked a bit to a tiny prayer hut i had made a mental note of while walking by earlier. i probably committed an act of blasphemy, but it was the perfect size to put a sleeping mat in and even had doors that could keep the wildlife and humidity out. i was pretty paranoid that at some point, the owner would come to close up the hut for the night and empty the collection box and throw me out, but after an hour of hiding in the bushes waiting for somebody to appear, i figured what the hell and made myself comfortable in there.

it turned out later that night that i wasn't the only one spending the night in there, when i repeatedly heard, but never saw, a rat running around, at one point, i think, even bumping into my sleeping bag. i just hoped i wouldn't wake up to an angry japanese man or any rodents nibbling on my ears, and fell soundly asleep.Leer más
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to nowhere in particular Viajero
climbing fuji #2
16–17 sept. 2024, Japón ⋅ ⛅ 15 °C
(sorry for the picture spam, but it was just so gorgeous and my new phone camera really worked its magic that day)

after a couple of hours of sleep, i woke up before sunset when another group of japanese hikers came by, shining their head torches at me just as stunned to see me in the hut as i was to see them at that time of day. in just a couple of minutes, i was ready to go. i was taking more pictures than steps during the next hour, but still made some good progress. so good in fact, that i decided that i could probably summit the same day and make it back to fifth in time for the last bus down from the observation deck, essentially saving a full day. and that's precisely what i did.

the ascent wasn't technical, just switchbacks all the way, with seemlingly hundreds of mountain huts on both sides of the path to accomodate for all the tourists in high season. you can google how it crowded it usually gets up there. all of a sudden, i couldn't have been happier to hike the trail off season. still, as usual, i started feeling the altitude around the 3.5k mark. it didn't take away from the spectacular views though.

relieved that the weather hadn't flipped on me, i reached the summit around noon and enjoyed lunch to one of the best views of my trip. after a victory lap around the crater, it was time head back down. i was very thankful i brought my gaiters, which made sliding down the scree a lot easier, and in less than two hours, i was back at fifth.

after a little interview from a very intrigued older japanese gentleman, i hopped on the bus and was back at my forest camp spot by the trailhead in no time.

if you followed attentively to this point, you might've noted that i haven't showered for almost a week at this point. thankfully, i noticed this too, and in a stroke of genius, decided to go to an onsen. it's a type of hot spring bath house where japanese people traditionally go once a week to get a deep clean. butt ass naked. i got a couple of stares and almost passed out from overdoing the sauna, but all in all the perfect end to a 10/10 day.Leer más
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to nowhere in particular Viajero
tokyo
18–25 sept. 2024, Japón ⋅ ☁️ 32 °C
smack-dab on the 365th day of my trip, i arrived in tokyo. i had a full week to spend there until my flight back to china, so i explored the city, made some friends at the hostel, ran a 20k under the tv tower, went to museums and art galleries (the latter a newfound interest), scavenged through second hand markets, and snuck into a 5 star hotel to get a good view on the shibuya crossing.

to this point still, i had survived off of supermarket food the entire time, so i was more than thankful when an older japanese guy from the hostel insisted on making some food just for me so i could get a taste of real japanese quisine. it was really good, but of course not quite ikea-hot-dog-good.

all in all, i got a really really good impression of japan. the people are the right mix of polite and helpful, and they are 100% the masters of making things convenient. everything is clean, everything works effectively, but everything is always a little weird and somehow more oversaturated and over the top.

the way to the airport takes two hours, so i arrived way too late for my flight to shanghai. although i had been to china twice without complications, this time, the japanese guy at the ticket counter demanded a return flight ticket from me, which i didn't have. there was an italian guy there facing the exact same problem, so within 5 minutes, we both had both pressure-booked some cheap, refundable flights, were finally handed our tickets and were off the ground within an hour.Leer más
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to nowhere in particular Viajero
shanghai
26–30 sept. 2024, China ⋅ ☀️ 28 °C
maybe it was just my experience, but i feel like shanghai is massively overrated. it's way more westernized than the other parts of china i had been to before, which makes it easier to get around, but in the end, it just ends up being less interesting. after seeing the tv tower and the bund, there really wasn't much more to do. i took to rooftopping and bumble dating instead and busied myself with figuring out how i was going to get to bangkok from here within two weeks. in retrospect, those two weeks would've been much more enjoyable if i'd just taken a plane from tokyo to bkk, but at the same time, i'm glad i pushed through with my no-planes-policy.Leer más
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to nowhere in particular Viajero
chongqing
1–3 oct. 2024, China ⋅ ⛅ 17 °C
the last available train to chongqing left in the early morning before the metros opened, so i had to haul a taxi to get me there. as it turned out though, i wasn't the only one going to the train station that day (absolute gargantuans compared to the euro ones btw), so i got stuck in traffic. still, by a miracle, or perhaps rather by frantically sprinting through the station, i somehow managed to get on my train just in time. this was the first and last proper high-speed train i had taken, and going almost 400 kmh, i was already in hangzhou before i'd caught my breath again.

this is where my master plan finally came together. i had already been in hangzhou in july before embarking on my trip to korea and japan, which means the two flights i had taken since were essentially part of a closed loop, leaving an unbroken path of strict overlanding that i would now continue.

i spent the rest of the day meandering through the beautiful,lakeside parks of hangzhou, watching seniors dancing and getting some much deserved sleep, before heading to the station again to catch my connecting train to chongging. thirty hours. it was bad, but honestly, i've gotten really got at sitting by now, so not even that bad.

chongging was pretty surreal. by some accounts, it's the largest city in the world, yet i hadn't even heard about it until i went to china for the first time. it's futuristic and dystopian at the same time. coming in on the train, i saw many old tiny relinquished huts and farm houses standing below in the literal shadow of the gigantic bridge systems i was travelling on. i'll upload an image i found online, also from chongqing, but seen the other way.

when i was in chongging, it was the first of october, which is basically like the chinese version of the 4th of july. i had been warned that heaps of chinese would be travelling with me at the same time, but nothing could've prepared me for what i experienced there. i was on the street with literal millions of others. mixed with police blockading every other street and the notorious asian walking pace, this was the closest thing to hell i've ever experienced. it took me over an hour to get to the subway station, which was only ten minutes away. but chongging wasn't all bad: the hills on the outskirt of the city with temples on top make for great views in the evening, they had a great art gallery, and once again, i tried my luck with rooftopping. i also found a little sewing shop that was able to stitch my missing flags onto my backpack. after three days, i had enough and hopped on the train again, this time to kunming.Leer más
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Fin del viaje
20 de diciembre de 2024