Day 2 – 28 April 2025, Monday

After a restful night, I woke up at 6:30am to another day of cloudy skies and 23 degrees C weather. When I checked the forecast, it showed that there was a 30% to 50% chance of rain for the rest of the day. I was dismayed because we had already made plans to cycle today, but the 50% figure made me slightly hopeful. I told the rest that the weather looked fine for now and hoped it wouldn’t rain.

We had breakfast at our apartment, comprising of egg and tuna sandwiches we bought from FamilyMart last night. We really love these sandwiches. The bread is so soft and fluffy, and most importantly, they don’t stinge on the fillings. These sandwiches are awesome and we stock them up every night without fail.

We left our apartment at 8:30am and walked to the e-CHARIty bicycle rental shop at Kokusai-dori, arriving about 15 minutes later. They officially open at 9:00am so we waited for the staff to arrive and pull up the shutters to the store.

The shop was manned by a lady and a gentleman, who was the mechanic. The lady retrieved my booking and they proceeded to set up our bicycles. We booked three cross bikes (aka hybrid bikes) for the guys and an e-bike for ZY. However, PL tested one of the cross bikes and found that the lowest gear could not be engaged. The mechanic couldn’t resolve the issue and there were no other cross bikes available, so he replaced the faulty one with a road bike, at no additional charge (the road bike is more expensive to rent). PL ended up using the road bike while IH and I took the cross bikes, and ZY had the e-bike.

PL had some tummy issues so he cycled back to our apartment while the mechanic tried to fix the bike. While waiting, we chatted with the lady, who was very friendly and spoke good English. I asked her why the shop was called “e-charity”, since it’s not for charitable purposes. She explained that the name is actually not referring to “charity” but “chari”, an informal name for bicycle in Japanese. And since the shop specialises in providing e-bike rental services, they called it “e-chari”, but the name gradually evolved to “e-charity” instead. Perhaps the “ty” at the end means “thank you”. That’s why if you look carefully at the shop’s logo, it actually reads “e-CHARIty”, with “CHARI” in block letters. Now you know!

By the time we got through all the delays, it was already 10:00am when we started cycling. The rain also started to fall, just a light drizzle at first. We were well-prepared for wet weather and brought along our waterproof jackets. I also brought my waterproof mobile phone case from Decathlon that I used for last year’s Jeju cycling trip and mounted it on my Giant cross bike for easy navigation.

For today, we will follow the route on the Velodash app and cycle around Southern Okinawa in a clockwise direction, a loop covering around 68km with an elevation gain of 443m. The ride is expected to take about 7 hours, so we should complete our ride around 5:00pm. In any case, we will need to return the bikes before e-CHARIty closes at 6:00pm.

I was the navigator for today. I quickly realised that the Velodash app doesn’t have voice prompts for directions, which was inconvenient as I frequently had to check the map on my phone to make sure that we were going in the right direction. The rain and my wet phone caused the transparent screen on my mounted phone case to fog up inside, making it hard to see the map through the screen. For last year’s Jeju cycling trip, the tour company we engaged (Travel Wander) pre-loaded the maps on a different cycling app called Ride With GPS, and it came with very clear voice prompts at every turn so we didn’t have to look at the map as often. So definitely, the Velodash app isn’t as good as Ride With GPS.

The first part out of Naha city was heavy with traffic. After leaving Kokusai-dori, we cycled on the pavement but proceeded cautiously because of the slippery ground. With the numerous traffic lights and frequent stops for navigation checks, our progress was slow and it took us around one hour to cover the first 10km.

The further away we got from Naha city centre, the calmer it became as the traffic volume reduced, so we cycled on the road. However, the scenery was pretty unremarkable as we mostly passed through small towns with residential homes and local businesses. For Jeju last year, the route was almost completely coastal so we were constantly cycling beside the sea, which was awesome. The scenery did get better as we approached Cape Chinen and had a bit of coastal views. However, the gloomy skies and rain meant that we didn’t see the famous Okinawa Blue views of the ocean.

At 12:15pm, we stopped for a break at a pavilion at Cape Chinen Park, roughly the 24km mark. We fuelled up on chocolate bars and took shelter from the rain. After checking the elevation profile on Velodash, we saw that there would be a steep climb at the 41km mark before reaching Peace Memorial Park, with a maximum elevation of 101m. This would be the biggest climb for the day, so we decided to conquer it first and have lunch after.

The moment we resumed cycling, the rain got even heavier, like our thunderstorms in Singapore. I’m quite used to cycling in the rain but it was a new experience for the others. Our waterproof jackets kept us relatively warm so it was bearable.

After Cape Chinen, the terrain became hillier so we had to work much harder. The hills reminded me of my Taiwan round-the-island cycling trip in 2023. ZY’s e-bike proved very useful as she could zoom up the hills without breaking a sweat while the rest of us had to pedal hard to overcome the hills. However, her e-bike has a speed limit of 24km/h so we would overtake her on the downhill sections. But anyway, we couldn’t go very fast because of the wet ground so I gripped my brakes and handlebar extra tightly on the downhill sections.

The views on the southeastern stretch were the best but we couldn’t really soak it up because of the rain. Instead, we were being soaked by the rain! When we cycled through the small towns, the traffic was lighter so it was enjoyable riding there. We had an option to do a detour to Ojima Island but decided to skip it since the weather wasn’t favourable.

After conquering the most challenging section for the day, we stopped for lunch at 1:45pm at the first town we encountered. We found a restaurant called Yubido, which has a large dining area for tour groups. I ordered the katsu don (1,100 yen/S$10.12), which came with a bowl of hot soup with Okinawa noodles and some side dishes. The katsu don was not as good as the one I had in Gora last year but it was still very much appreciated. After being soaked to the skin for the past few hours, we were just grateful to have a place to sit and have a warm meal in our bellies.

After lunch, the rain was lighter but the wind was stronger and it felt much colder than earlier when we were all soaked. Maybe it was because our bodies cooled down once we stopped cycling so the temperature difference felt starker after that. We unintentionally took a shortcut because I assumed we were supposed to keep going straight. As a result, we skipped Cape Kyan and missed about 5km of the distance. Anyway, we wanted to end the ride early, before e-CHARIty closes, so it was no big loss.

From Itoman onwards, the terrain was relatively flat as the buildings got denser and taller. We crossed a couple of bridges over water bodies, using the park connector cycling paths. The rain finally stopped, though the sky was still dark with heavy clouds that threatened to pour any moment. We continued riding back to the Naha city centre and managed to return to e-CHARIty at 4:30pm, well before the 6:00pm closing time. In the end, we cycled a distance of about 65km, not far from the 68km we targeted.

After dropping the bikes off at the shop, PL and ZY went back to the apartment first while IH and I went to grab some hot coffee from Starbucks and sandwiches from FamilyMart. After all that we went through, I really needed a cup of hot coffee to reward myself. After a warm shower, we munched on snacks and played a few rounds of Bridge before heading out at 7:00pm for dinner.

IH suggested having dinner at Kokusai Street Food Village, located about 15 minutes away from our apartment, so we walked there to check it out. It was a cluster of 20 small eateries and I thought the atmosphere was quite nice and cosy, with each restaurant having only about 6 tables outside and a bar counter inside.

However, PL was craving for sashimi and they didn’t have it at Kokusai Street Food Village so we adjourned to the area near Makishi Public Market, where there were many independent restaurants and izakayas along the narrow alleys. It felt more authentic and not as touristy at Kokusai Street Food Village. PL found a restaurant that served sashimi and sushi so we ate there. We ordered several plates to share, and had Orion beers to go with it.

We were still not fully satisfied so we searched for another place that sold yakitori. With the help of Google Maps, we found another place nearby that was quite similar in concept to Kokusai Street Food Village, but less crowded. We ordered unagi (my favourite), several sticks of Okinawa wagyu beef, squid and king mackerel fish. The beef was very good. We also ordered black pork and waited a long time for it, only to find out that they missed our order so we gave up on it.

After that, we dropped by Don Quijote to buy some laundry bags and of course, FamilyMart to raid their stock of egg sandwiches. Back at our apartment, we placed our wet shoes in the laundry bags and into the dryer at the common lift landing, hoping to get them dried. However, the tumbling of the shoes caused such a ruckus that would definitely alarm our neighbours, so we immediately stopped the dryer. We decided to try again tomorrow afternoon, hopefully when our neighbours are not around so we won’t disturb them.

Overall, it was a fun day despite the unfavourable weather. I thought the cycling was not that tough despite the hills we had. The scenery was nice on the east coast but we couldn’t enjoy it fully because of the rain, which was a real pity. I didn’t take much photos and videos because the rain made it a hassle to remove my phone from the mount and wipe it dry, which still caused fogging inside the mounted case. Nevertheless, the rain definitely made the ride more memorable. At least it wasn’t hot or that cold. Hope the weather will be better for our next two days of cycling in Nago on Thursday and Friday!