Favorite Pictures Vol.1.5

Another shot from the ferry

Heavy rain in Tokyo

Shot at dusk 35km north from Sendai

Random coastline shot

Same as above

Favorite Pictures Vol.1

I emptied my first memory card on my computer and edited some of my favorite shots to be posted here. I'd like to remind you, that I am NOT a very good photographer nor do I have a professional grade camera.


From the Hakodate-Aomori Ferry

View of some mountains in Hokkaido

Lake Toya in the blue moment

A mountain stream in Hokkaido

The obligatory car lights shot from Osaka

Tokyo Ranger

I must apologize for the lack of posts in a while. I made it to Tokyo and got a horrible flu that kept me down for a while. Also Tokyo is something that took quite a while to kinda sink in for me, it is overwhelmingly huge.

Well, let's get the most unpleasant news out of the way right at the start. My right foot has gotten it's share of punishment along the years, including a few surgeriers and metal rods inside. It went basicaly completely immobile, swollen and incredibly painful.

After waiting for it to get better in Tokyo to no avail, I decided to call it quits, since I was kinda planning to do another skateboarding journey next year and I don't wanna destroy my legs completely.

I made my way to Tokyo Tower that seemed appropriate ending point, considering that I started from Sapporo TV Tower. Thus I travelled around 1300-1400 kilometers, in about a month, trough horribly hard terrain and weather. I am most pleased with my self and I had really good time.

Now on to talking about Tokyo. It is really hard to longboard in there. My board rules in down hills and long distance but it really isn't designed to being a snappy city cruiser. Tokyo also has a lot of people, bikes, cars and other stuff that comes on the way.

Tokyo is ludicrously huge. I don't know how it would feel like for someone from a another actual metropolis. To me it is just... Incredible. The aproach with skateboard was a weird dystopian nightmare, 150km of nothing but urban area, the last six hours in darknes and rain. To put things in perspective, the whole Finland has a slightly bigger area than Japan. The population of Finland is about 5,2 million people. The population of Tokyo is about 13 million people, and counting the suburbs, around 32 million.

I come from a relativley big city in Finland, Turku. The population of Turku is 175 422 people (according to wikipedia) with population density of 714 people/km².

Comparing this to the 13 million people living in a city with population density of 5,847 /km² makes my head hurt.

There is so much to see and do in Tokyo, it would take like a year to get the basic grasp of the place. It is still very interesting, I can very warmly recommend Tokyo BakPak Hostel as a place of residence, if you're contemplating a trip to Tokyo. Very nice place, even nicer people and awesome atmosphere and a convenient location 5min walk from the Minowa station, that is few stops from Ueno station. The staff also speak very good english.

Even tho I'm heading home, I still have lots of stuff to tell, hundreds of pictures and few hours of video to share.

Thank you for your patience and a humble apology for the long pause in writing, stay tuned for more.

I`m too lazy to write so I post more pictures

That was one really sick hill.


The views were awesome on the coast of Iwate though the roads were horribly hard



When I asked if the board is weatherproof, I ment it. I was looking pretty much same.


This is the main reason i keep bitchin about rain. I mean yeah, it is uncomfortable and it makes my stuff wet and heavy. But the worst part is what it does to my feet. You know how your feet and hands are all wrinkly and soft after a bath? Well that happens in the rain too. And when I`m skating with my feet like that, they develop hideous blisters and generaly hurt a lot. There is also high risk of infections.


Sometimes rain is nice because you can find company while taking shelter. Here is a cat (I was requested for more cat pictures) whom with I shared a dry spot and a can of macrell while waiting for the rain to end.

K-ON! is loev





I said goodbye to the Route 45 in Sendai. We had good times.




Sendai cityscape

She sells seashells by the seashore.

The plentifull Vending machines keep me alive

I really went berserk with gaffer tape. Works fine now tho.

Cliss road was rather overwhelming

The suite in the abandoned hotel I slept in

Cool

Now with the pictures

The man who smells of sunflowerswas nowhere to be seen


Kenshiro doesn`t look all that happy.



New Merrel shoes. Very Nice

The old skateboarding shoes bought from Kuji lasted to Sendai

I only had Zippo fuel for my beercan stove. Heated the water nicely but produced rather dramatic pyrotechnics and blackened the kettle really bad.

A Quickie

Still pushing hard. The weather has been relatively nice and I`ve capitalized on the good weathers and pushed hard. The humidity is still a problem, I washed some laundry a few days back and still hasn`t dried. And judging from the hideous odor emitting from my bag it is starting to rot and/or brew. My bag is allso sporting a patch of moss. Niiice... I might have to ditch those shirts and socks unless I somehow manage to dry them off.

Today was rather exiting, I found a HUGE abandoned industrial complex. I don`t quite surely know what it had been, maybe an oil refinery. I was thinkin about staying there for the night but while I as exploring the premises, the police decided to show up. I considered applying the Baka Gaijin technique that has gotten me out of sme sticky situations before. That means speaking very very little japanese and being very sorry and very dumb. But since I had my camping equipment with me and no hotel reservations, I decided to just do things ninja style and simply slipped out of there unnoticed. Probably saved me from getting ticketed at the least. This is just a crappy computer in a small cafe so again no pictures, sorry.

Freecamping is illegal in Japan so I`m pretty much breaking at least two laws everytime I pitch my tent somewhere else than a designated camping area. As I have now just left Miyagi prefecture behind me, the population density is drasticaly raising and the surroundings are lot more urban. That means good campsites are very hard to come by.

Hopefully I can find a decent internet cafe soon and make a better post with pictures.