Miike Coal Mine and Miike Port and Sakitsu Village in Amakusa

Waypoint introductions and full write-ups

1. 1. Miike Coal Mine and Miike Port

   On the flat shore of the Ariake Sea in Kyushu, in the city of Omuta, a set of brick buildings, steel headframes and tidal docks tells the story of how Japan became an industrial power. The Miike coal mine and the port that served it were inscribed by UNESCO in 2015 among the sites of Japan's Meiji industrial revolution, and the centre of Omuta is a few kilometres away, with a city of about a hundred and thirty thousand people spread around it.

   Read the complete Miike Coal Mine and Miike Port write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Miike Coal Mine and Miike Port is where the day begins. Next is Misumi West Port.

2. 2. Misumi West Port

   At the tip of the Uto Peninsula in Kumamoto, where the land narrows towards the islands of Amakusa, there is a small Meiji-era harbour that looks almost unchanged since it was finished in 1887. Misumi West Port was designed by the Dutch engineer Rouwenhorst Mulder as part of Japan's rapid modernisation after it opened to the West, and its long stone quays, drainage channels and carefully fitted granite blocks were built by Japanese stonemasons using their traditional skills. For a while it was a busy export port for coal from the Miike mines across the bay, but when the railway reached another harbour its importance faded, which is precisely why it survived. It is now part of the World Heritage site of Japan's Meiji industrial revolution.

   Read the complete Misumi West Port write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Misumi West Port comes up about 78 km into the recorded legs. Next is Sakitsu Village in Amakusa.

3. 3. Sakitsu Village in Amakusa

   A small Gothic church with a spire stands right at the water's edge in Sakitsu, a fishing village tucked into an inlet on the southern coast of Amakusa's Shimoshima island. It looks almost Breton, a surprise in rural Kyushu, and the story behind it is one of the most moving in Japanese history. When Christianity was banned in the early seventeenth century, the people of Sakitsu kept their faith in secret for over two centuries, disguising prayers and objects as Buddhist or Shinto practice, and using things from their own fishing life, such as abalone shells whose inner patterns recalled holy images, as objects of devotion.

   Read the complete Sakitsu Village in Amakusa write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   about 152 km into the recorded legs you reach Sakitsu Village in Amakusa. Next is back through Misumi West Port.

4. 4. back through Misumi West Port

   Return visit. Read the place description above.

   Read the complete Misumi West Port write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   back through Misumi West Port, late in the day. Next is Miike Coal Mine and Miike Port.

5. 5. Miike Coal Mine and Miike Port

   Return visit. Read the place description above.

   Read the complete Miike Coal Mine and Miike Port write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Back at Miike Coal Mine and Miike Port. That is the ride.