Since it's a relaxing holiday week, I've been able to take more casual bicycle rides. Ayako and I went yesterday and there were some great photos that I wanted to take. So I set out today to take some of them. This is my usual bicycle ride that takes about 30 minutes. I go to the areas where I can avoid traffic as much as possible. So here we go...we start off on the bicycle path in front of our house:
Past the boats:
And a heron:
Then to the rice fields:
It was a nice sunny day as usual:
A close-up of the rice for you...should be ready in a month or two:
To keep the crows away, there are various devices used...such as CDs:
plastic bags:
and regular scarecrows...complete with heads:
and some with only heads:
We then get onto some quiet country lanes:
past some a new housing development:
and up into the hills:
The top of the hill is full with Mandarin orange orchards, which means that only farmers come up here and there's nice quiet roads to cycle along. The trees in the photo are full of oranges, but since they are still green, they'll be hard to see:
Nice quiet roads:
Then back down towards to the lake:
Along some nice bends:
Getting closer:
And back down to the rice fields. You can see the highway going over the lake in this shot:
Some signs showing that downtown Hamamatsu is 14km away, the speed limit is 40km/h, and there's no parking allowed on the side of the road:
There's tons of mirrors in Japan to show you if somebody is coming around a corner and warning you to be careful:
A children's crosswalk:
The double-headed panda telling you to stop, look left and look right:
And back to the rice fields as the sun starts getting lower in the sky:
Rows of rice:
A woman working in the rice fields:
And back to the lake:
A heron relaxing on a log in the sunlight:
Then back along the bicycle path:
And back home before sunset:
Hope you enjoyed the bicycle ride.
and then running in over-sized shorts:
The next event was for elementary school children and their parents. They had to stick their face in rice flour to find one small rice ball:
and then run (looking like a clown) with a soccer ball around some pylons:
The next event was for adults from the nearby areas. I helped my local area in the tug-of-war event:
Here are some close-up shots of me in action:
And finally, here is Ayako and myself in front of the 'close friend' gate (exit gate) where the competitors leave through after each event (the entry gate was called the 'try your best' gate):
This was only a small bit of the entire day. We left at the lunch break and ate lunch in a small park nearby. 
