On the ride from Himeji to Kobe, I met a man called Kenji-san. He started talking to me before I went into a katsudon restaurant. He asked me how far I was going. After talking about cycling, we had katsudon together too. He's already retired, but he said that these days he enjoys riding his bike and playing the piano. Even at his age he was so full of life, and he made a real impression on me. He treated me to the katsudon as well. Of course, we took a photo together as a keepsake. I said to Kenji-san, "thank you for treating me! Good luck with your piano practice!"

At Akashi Castle I met and talked to three people. They're Japanese, but apparently they lived in Thailand and Myanmar for a long time doing volunteer work.

I also met a man called Yoshihiro-san. He was riding from Kyoto to Himeji in one day! Unreal! He started cycling at fifteen and has competed in lots of races too. When he said he also works at Paul Smith, I was really surprised, because my uncle and aunt work at Paul Smith too. I'd heard it was popular in Japan, but I didn't think it was popular enough to have a shop in every city! He was really cool and a great talker. No wonder he works in customer service, I thought.

It must have been about half past seven when I arrived in Kobe. It had already got dark, and the campsite was 5 km from the city centre. I'd phoned the campsite and been told I could arrive at any time, so I decided to have dinner in Kobe. But Kobe was livelier than I'd expected, and everyone was out drinking. All the restaurants were too expensive and full as well. After an hour of pushing my bike through the streets of Kobe looking for a suitable place, I finally found a yakisoba restaurant with space. Kobe's specialities are beef steak and yakisoba, and the steaks were all over 4,000 yen, so I went for yakisoba.

I thought how great it would be to drink loads and mess about if I were with my friends, but I have to ride to Osaka tomorrow, so I only drank water.

The centre of Kobe had a really dark atmosphere. It's like a Japanese Arkham, and I wouldn't be surprised if Batman suddenly leapt out of the shadows. It's similar to Hiroshima, but in some way I can't quite explain, Kobe felt more intense.

Kobe's suburbs were really distinctive too. It's a port city, but it's close to the mountains, and the roads in the suburbs are really steep, with a completely different atmosphere from the centre. Rivers cut through the suburbs as well, so the scenery was good. Sometimes the contrast between a city centre and its suburbs is really interesting.

I got to the area where the campsite was supposed to be, but there was nothing that looked like a campsite. It was still a suburban residential area. When I went to the address Google Maps was directing me to, there was nothing but the car park at the entrance to a block of flats. Before I knew it, a sense of unease crept in. Something's wrong. I sat down for a moment, dialled the campsite's number, and called. When I asked, "could you tell me the address?", they gave me a completely different address from where I was. When I looked it up on Google Maps, it was 20 km away, and up in some pretty high mountains at that. Even if I'd left straight away, I wouldn't have made it in time. After I hung up, I shouted in anger. Wondering what to do, I started riding around the surrounding area. It was already dark, so I wanted to find somewhere to stay quickly and go to sleep. After about 20 minutes of riding, I found a small park running alongside a river. Camping might well be prohibited in a park like this, but there was nowhere else to stay. I pitched my tent beside a hedge. My tent's waterproof cover is a pretty bright orange, so I decided not to use it so I wouldn't be spotted. Right now I'm inside the tent, praying that it doesn't rain.

Random note: sometimes the words don't come out, but whether I've talked about something before really makes a difference.