Today we start on our way back. Kyoto being the most western location in Japan we were going to stay at, now we follow another route through the mountains to eventually end up back in Tokyo. First stop of the day is Hikone castle, one of the few castles in Japan that weren't rebuild in the 60s out of solid concrete. A visit to the museum is also included in the entrance ticket, so we start of there. It's the usual mixture of every day items, armours and clothing, as well as architecture of that time. The museum also houses the old Noh theatre, which appears to still be in use at this time.
Then the castle itself. The main building is not terribly large, as most of the space within its walls was probably used to house the citizens of Hikone during attacks, but along with the gate houses, most of the castle has been preserved. The view over Biwa lake from the castle makes clear that it was a very strategic position, back in the days.
A small, but very nice garden accompanies the castle, and by the time we finish with our visit, we decide for a quick takoyaki and some drinks from the inevitable vending machine to go back on the road again, as soon as possible. Since the weather had been so cold the last couple of days, the bike rental firm had provided us with alternative routes, but since they had more express-way, and less curving mountain roads, our choice is to chance it with the original routes, and fall back on the new route if all else fails.
Of course, this means that about 10 kilometres from the end of today's route, we come face to face with a road that is closed off, and a mountain range between us and the final destination. Looking around though, we spot a large bridge, followed by a huge tunnel which doesn't appear in the GPS, but seems to go in the right direction. We decide to take the gamble, and the brand new tunnel turns out to be a 6 kilometres long tunnel, straight through the mountain range, taking us to just outside the village we're going to stay for the night. Sometimes the answers can be just 500 meters away...