Travels with Tackawanna 9: Mishima

I had an earlier start than usual today. The maintenance staff at the University were performing maintenance on the water system today, so I had to get up earlier in order to take a shower. While I was ready early, I decided to get on my way towards my route for today.

I traveled to Mishima, a small town part of the larger Oonuma District, whose area is larger than Aizuwakamatsu but also whose population is one-tenth of Aizuwakamatsu's. Districts in Japan are becoming more popular in the rural areas. As these populations shrink and technology improves, it gets harder and harder to justify these smaller towns running their own business. Therefore, they team up with other smaller towns in the area to make a district.

Here's the route that I took. In order to get to the starting point (Fukushima Prefecture Route 32), I had to take National Route 401. I did not film my time on Route 401, but I should have, because as I went further south, the road became quite scenic, and representative of how roads in rural Japan truly are. Unfortunately, I was playing music in the car at the time, so to avoid getting DMCA'd, I can't post the footage. Maybe in the future I'll do the whole route as a dashcam.

If you're one of the four people who read my TwT posts, you'll have probably picked up on two things. The first is that I've recently been editing my videos to reduce some of the glare, shake, and background noice. The second is that the general post theme that the roads maintained by the prefecture can be tight, tiny, and esoteric, while the roads maintained by the national government are straighter, smoother, and less surprising. However, the aforementioned road types swapped their characteristics today. Route 401 was very narrow when passing through Aizumisato. I mean narrow as in my car was over the "center line" without deliberate action. Later on, after a nice, long tunnel to get the standing heat out of Tackawanna, it turned into a seasonal (that part actually surprised me), six mile-long road with so many curves. On the flipside, the southern portion of Route 32 actually had lane markers on the side and the edges. Apparently, it serves as an artery for plenty of smaller hamlets in the area, and there was even a construction area where they were still working on a wider bridge.

But Route 59 brought back those oddball rural road characteristics. I actually missed the turn onto it because it was inconspicuously hiding behind a corner shop. As soon as I turned onto it, however, I was met with a driveway-width road with a massive freaking hairpin curve at the start. There was also moss growing in the center of the road between the usual tire contact points. What's more, only half of the road had guard rails. That meant that nothing was stopping you from that 200 foot drop into the creek below in certain places. It was actually a bit terrifying.

In any event, it looks like I may not be able to do much travelling for summer vacation at all. My scope has been significantly shortened to a four-day sprint to Hachinohe and back via National Route 45 and the expressways. Even that will cost some significant money, although I will have the cash on hand to do it. I will need to decide tomorrow if I am actually going to go through with it.

That's all I have for now. Time for bed.

-wp