A Drive in Ehime Prefecture

What?
Izumidani (泉谷) is a tiny village which only claim to fame are its rice terraces that are perched on a steep mountain slope. Be aware that the harvesting season begins in September. Shikoku Karst (四国カルスト) is a highland dotted with exposed limestones on the border of Ehime (愛媛県) and Kochi Prefectures (高知県). A few walking paths can take you 30 minutes in about any direction, but it’s really the beautiful vista’s you come for. DD4D Brewery & Clothing store is a place that combines apparel with local craft beer Matsuyama (松山).
Where?
You can check out bus schedules any time you like, but the simple fact is that you can only get to these remote places in Ehime and Kochi Prefecture by car. There’s just no other way. The DD4D Brewery though is an easy 5 minute walk from Matsuyamashi Station (松山市駅) on the Iyo Railway (伊予鉄道).
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I don’t have a lot of driving experience, but I already know that the roads in Shikoku can be a real challenge. This time however I was in the company of a confident driver, so I kind of “used” him to get to 2 different, rather difficult to reach spots.
Well, to be honest, Shikoku Karst shouldn’t be all that difficult to reach. It was from where we came though.

Ehime Prefecture’s attractions aren’t necessarily few, but they are far between. The initial idea would be to drive from Matsuyama to the Sada Cape and then continue on to Shikoku Karst, passing along the way by the Izumidani rice terraces. Just these three options would result in over 7 hours driving, which was a bit too long after yesterday’s hike up to Mount Ishizuchi. So we skipped the Sada Cape which was farthest away and headed straight for the rice terraces.

Being the end of September, there is a chance the rice was already harvested. The harvesting season is from early September until mid-October, but it having been such a long and hot summer we kind of hoped the harvesting got delayed a little. In each case, driving through the prefecture, it seemed to us most of the harvesting still needed to be done, so we had high hopes.
As expected, the road towards the terraces turned very narrow when nearing our destination, but considering previous experiences I thought it was still very easy driving. Only one car approached from the other direction and we were lucky it was around one of the broader sections of the road. We soon found out why so few people came up though: while down in the valley most rice fields were either still fully planted or in the process of being harvested, the rice terraces here at the Izumidani village were nearly all devoid of rice plants.
It was a bit of a bummer, but it was still a very pretty sight, and despite the smog-like air quality we still had some great views on the terraces, the valley, and the mountainous backdrop.

Picturesque building next to the terraces.

Well intended, I'm sure. But scary.

Beautiful, also without the rice.

Flashback to Mount Ishizuchi along the way.

After snapping a few pictures, we continued on our way towards Shikoku Karst. Now we could have just gone back to the main road, but like mostly everyone else on this planet, we rely a bit too much on google maps. So instead of turning left towards an easy to drive 2-way street, we turned right in what we thought was a good move to shorten our drive.
It all started out ok. The road was rather new, narrow but not too narrow with enough spots broad enough to cross any cars coming from the other direction. And then things got serious.

Positive: there was a confident driver behind the wheel and we were pretty sure no other cars would come our way.
Negative: this was no road. This used to be a pavement which was bulldozered by a herd of elephants.
Even with all careful driving, at some point the road was deformed in such a way that a part of it protruded out in such a place that we had no other choice but to drive over it and hope it wouldn’t rip the underside of the car apart. It only scratched it, but we did go and take a look whether anything was leaking.
Turning back was not an option. There simply is no place to do so.
We stopped along the way at a few spots admiring the local river scenes, but eventually we were relieved to get back to the broad main road again. It must have taken like two hours.
At the main road I noticed a sign saying Shikoku Karst and it decidedly pointed in a different direction than google maps. This time we ignored technology and just followed the road signs. A wise decision, giving that afterwards we saw that google maps’ route was off-limits.
It was Saturday though, so there were many cars on the move with the occasional traffic jam on the narrower parts of the roads as a consequence.

Eventually we arrived at Shikoku Karst along with hundreds of other people. I’m pretty sure there were a few walking paths somewhere, but if you park anywhere where you are able to, you get pretty much the same view. The road is built on an impressive ridge with stones (karst) strewn around everywhere. The occasional cow is feasting on the lush green grass with pretty much the whole of Ehime and Kochi Prefectures visible before their uncomprehending eyes. I did find it a pity that most of the karst field was sealed off with barbed wire, so it was only possible to stay on the concrete road.
The scenery remained impressive though, and for a drive it is perfect. If you desire to also have a short walk through a karst field however, I would recommend the Akiyoshi Karst Field. If you look for a hike with rewarding karst field views, Mount Ryozen is the place to go.

The drive back to Matsuyama was uneventful, which was a good thing. As we had some energy left to spend the evening, we went into the city and paid a visit to the DD4D Brewery & Clothing Shop. Do not ask me about the concept of this store. There is a brewery behind glass and a bar inside a rather iffy clothing shop, and customers for either the apparel or the beverage don’t seem to communicate with each other in any way. But still, I must admit they had some nice beers on tap, for example the beers brewed with sake yeast. In any case, it did beat by far the next bar we wanted to enter: while they advertised themselves as “craft beer bar”, all beer was sold out. A bar without beer – it makes you sad.