PEACECLES & PILGRIMS

I am standing in a long, light white tunnel with nautical mosaics on the walls. No cars or lorries are allowed in here. It’s for cyclists and walkers only. I am so delighted, I sing; the acoustics, predictably, are perfect.

A weird dream? Well no – except that cycling around the coast of Shikoku in Japan, over the Shimanami Kaido cyleway and onto Hiroshima almost, is the stuff of dreams. In 1200 kilometres we barely had to leave a smooth, coast-hugging, traffic-free cycleway (or tunnel), and when we did the 50-kilometre-per-hour speed limit meant it wasn’t an