Day 3
Iwaki, Fukushima - Daigo, Ibaraki

Distance: 103.81 km
Average: 18.0 km/h
Max: 59.4 km/h
Total Distance: 310.74 km

The highlight of my ride today was a driver of a car blaring her horn at me while I was in a turn lane waiting to turn. I got pissed. Nothing happened, and as usual the real fun for the day didn’t actually start until I stopped for the day.

小山ダム (Koyama Dam, lit. “Little Mountain Dam”). A dam I passed by today

Nearing the end of the day, I followed signs to a huge public sports complex/park that also apparently had a campground. When I saw that there was a campground I figured on giving it a try, but when I found a road leading to it and a sign saying how much ist cost, I turned around to find something that cost more in the range of free.

Going further into the park, I came across a playground obviously built by someone who must love slides. There must have been up to ten slides in this playground, many of which were amazingly long. There was one in particular that has to be in contention for the world’s longest slide. It must have been over 300 feet long. Due to the way it curved and lots of trees in the park I wasn’t able to get a satisfactory photo of it, so I didn’t take one. But suffice it to say, it was an awesome slide.

So awesome in fact that it stole my heart and refused to let it go, so I felt I should appease the slide gods and stay at the playground for the night. To stay out of view of the road, I pitched my hammock from the poles of a gazebo far up the hill, which also happened to have a water faucet. Running water! Sponge baths for all! Laundry for all! Such luxury I received from that one water facet! But wait, there’s more!

Camping spot under the gazebo. A section of the Longest Slide Ever can be seen.

There was a bathroom at the bottom of the ill, and when I went in to use it I realized that the urinals’ motion sensors plugged directory into a wall socket. Eureka! I could charge my phone! This playground just won’t stop delivering!

Because the park officially closed at sundown and opened at 8:30 am, I assumed (read: hoped) that no one would be using the bathroom until well after I left the next morning. That ended up not being the case, kinda.

A bit after it got dark, a car pulled up and I saw a man walk over to the bathroom. There were trees in the way, so I couldn’t see very well (my campsite was hidden from the road, remember). In less time than it would have taken someone to do anything, I saw him come back out, pause shortly at the vening machines, then get back into his car and drive off. I figured it was just some guy buying something out of a vending machine and went to sleep.

It rained. A lot. I was quite happy I was under the gazebo.

The next morning the rain had stopped, and I headed down to the bathroom to pick up my newly-charged phone. Once the bathroom entrance came into view I stopped, a sinking feeling in my gut. That guy hadn’t been using the bathroom–he had been locking the park up. There was a big metal gate between where I was standing and my phone. I glanced over to the entrance to the parking lot, and sure enough that had also been gated closed. So that’s what the guy was doing. Apparently they’re serious about the park hours.

But… before giving up and waiting the 2.5 hours for the park to open up, I tentatively tried to open the bathroom gate. To my surprise… it opened! It wasn’t locked, so I suppose it’s there simply to keep wild animals from getting in and mucking up the bathrooms.

I went in, happily got my charged phone, packed up my stuff, carefully slipped my bike under the chain holding the parking lot gate locked shut, then was soon back on the road.

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