Cycling the Shimanami Kaido, Island to Island

Built for Bikes, Genuinely The Nishiseto Expressway crosses the Seto Inland Sea from Onomichi in Hiroshima to Imabari in Ehime, and when it was built each bridge got a separated cycling and pedestrian lane with its own gently graded approach ramp. That last detail is what makes the route accessible: instead of climbing to bridge height, you spiral up a long, shallow ramp. A blue line painted along the entire recommended route means you never need a map.

The Islands Are the Point Mukaishima, Innoshima, Ikuchijima, Ōmishima, Hakatajima and Ōshima each have their own character — Innoshima's pirate history from the Murakami clan who once controlled these straits, Ikuchijima's citrus terraces and art museum, Ōmishima's Ōyamazumi Shrine, which holds an extraordinary collection of armour and weapons donated by warriors over the centuries. You can stop anywhere; the ferries mean you're never committed.

The Practicalities That Make It Easy Rental terminals sit at both ends and on the islands, and many let you drop the bike at a different terminal than you collected it. Luggage forwarding between the two ends means you ride with nothing on your back. Electric assist bikes are widely available, which flattens the modest climbs for anyone unsure about the distance.

One Day or Three A fit rider does the full route in a long day. The better version takes two or three, stopping overnight on Ikuchijima or Ōmishima, eating at island ports, and finishing at Imabari — which is both Japan's towel-making capital and the gateway to Matsuyama and Dōgo Onsen, arguably the oldest hot spring bathhouse in the country. Ending a cycling trip in a 19th-century wooden bathhouse is a hard combination to beat.

What Makes This Route Unusual There are prettier rides in Japan and harder ones. What makes the Shimanami Kaidō internationally known is that it is a genuine long-distance cycleway rather than a road that happens to allow bicycles — each of the bridges carries a separate, protected cycle and pedestrian lane, physically divided from the traffic, and the approach ramps spiral gently up to bridge height instead of climbing steeply.

That design decision is why the route is rideable by people who are not cyclists. The gradients on the ramps are shallow and consistent, the island roads between bridges are flat to rolling, and the whole thing is signposted with a painted blue line on the road surface that you can follow without a map or a phone.

The Islands Are the Point It is possible to treat this as a distance to be completed, and that is the least interesting version. The islands each have something: Ōmishima has one of the oldest and most important shrines in the region, with an extraordinary collection of donated arms and armour; Ikuchijima has a temple complex of unrestrained decorative excess and a hillside of marble sculpture; several have citrus groves running down to the water and stands selling the results.

The route is also set up for stopping. Rental cycles can be dropped at terminals along the way rather than only at the ends, so an abandoned ride is a minor inconvenience rather than a crisis, and ferries provide alternatives if the weather turns.

Practicalities The full run is around seventy kilometres and a reasonably fit person on a decent bike will do it in a long day. Splitting it over two, with a night on one of the middle islands, is the better trip and turns it from an achievement into a holiday.

Rentals are widely available at both ends and at points along the route, e-bikes included, and a one-way rental with a drop-off at the far end is standard. Book ahead in spring and autumn weekends, when the route is busy with domestic riders. Bring sun protection regardless of season — there is a great deal of open water and very little shade on the bridges.