My first 10-speed bike was made by Panasonic. :)

Hi Barry and Mary Ellen
I’ve enjoyed the journal so much, especially since in exactly 5 weeks, I’ll be bound for Japan myself!
As part of my training, I’m going to try a couple of overnighters at Ruckle park to try out the camping gear, and of course to work on hill climbing! If you’re around, it would be great if I could pick your brains over lunch.
Hope the flight home goes smoothly.
Ron

If I get to Osaka some day, I will check this out. :)

What a gorgeous climb! Well done, Barry!

Not a silly question. It was a learning curve for me. Yes, you are naked. It didn’t take me long to become comfortable. Japanese women have done this all their lives from when they are infants. It is natural to them. They are very respectful and in a strange way you feel like you have privacy as no one violates that. I have heard that there are some that have a bathing suit option, but we never found one. Some older women occasionally use their small towel as a privacy option, but I saw this only a few times. Feel free to ask more ?’s if you like.

Perhaps a silly question - Do you go in naked or do people wear some kind of bathing suit?

Possibly a Japanese rat snake. Looks injured or dead.

https://www.inaturalist.org/taxa/68339-Elaphe-climacophora/browse_photos

Hope you are feeling better, Mary Ellen!

A day of extremes! I know how scary that is when you lose each other on the road, end of the day and in a storm. Janos and I have had a similar experience but yours was even a bit scarier.

I see it, too.

OMG - what a CUTE POM doggie!

Wow, that must be some cafe to eat at, with such a long line!

How nice of him. :)

This is rice porridge. Very common in China as well. It's a base where you add stuff to flavor it.

Interesting information - I would not have known that they had savory donuts!