after kanazawa oktoberfest, we went back to the station, retrieved our bags, and caught the local train for toyama, where we were going to stay the night. the next day was going to be climactic, the plan was that i was finally going to do something big that i had been putting off for a long time: i was going to drive in japan for the first time ever. out of all my friends who went to japan, i was the only one who had taken the trouble of securing an international driver's permit (IDP) that would allow me to rent a car and drive in japan. i had some vague notions of renting a car or a scooter at some point to go somewhere really off the beaten path, places unreachable by public transit plus lots of walking, but it had already been a month and i had barely even considered using the IDP, often even forgetting i had it. the reason i had put it out of my mind is because i was nervous about driving in japan, mainly because for some inexplicable reason japan drives on the LEFT, ⊕i forgot namori-sensei is from toyama until i looked down and saw the manhole covers in townone of the few countries that did so independently instead of having had it foisted upon them by the nefarious british. but now i had no choice, time was running out and one of the conditions under which my friend had agreed to extend his trip was that at some point we had to rent a car and go driving somewhere cool.

i was still stalling even as the fated day approached, refusing to look at rental cars ahead of time despite one of the lessons i've learned over the course of my trip is that in japan you should really try to book things at least a couple days in advance if you can. so, the next morning after checking out of our hotel we ended up at the saint marc café in toyama station with the intention of using their free wifi to book a car for the day. i browsed the big online travel agencies over a tatsuta sandwich (it is the ONLY thing they eat in Ever17, this was the first place in japan i saw with it on the menu so i HAD to get it) and things looked pretty hopeless, it looked like i might get away with not driving in japan once again, but then i checked budget japan and they miraculously had cars available that today at a stand just a block away from the station. my fate sealed, with a sense of resignation i booked their cheapest option, a kei-class car, which was nice because that was actually exactly the type of car i wanted, i have always wanted to drive a kei car.

we walked a block down the street to the rental stand and things went surprisingly smoothly, i had all the appropriate documents and within minutes we were out at the curb getting into our rental car, it felt like it was almost reckless of them to let me have a car this easily, maybe it helped that i demonstrated some basic japanese language skills and didn't mention this was my first time ever driving in japan. our car was the honda n-box, getting in it actually felt surprisingly spacious because the windshield is close to vertical so the ceiling gets as high as possible right away, you only really notice the size when you realize the front hood is almost non-existent, the back seats go right up to the back of the car without space for a trunk, and the cute little tires are barely wider than your shoes. overall it's very cozy and gets FORTY-FIVE miles per gallon, i would drive one back home if it was legal and if i didn't have to worry about getting pulverized by the $100k personal tanks most people are driving around these days in the US.

the first few minutes were terrifying, though i do tend to be an anxious driver in general (i prefer to refer to it as "defensive driving"). i tried to get of the city center as quickly as possible in whatever direction i could, following other cars so i could copy whatever they were doing in order to stay on the correct side of the road or obey traffic lights, which were hard for me to spot admist the chaotic and unfamiliar japanese streetscape that i was now viewing from the street for the first time. i quickly learned that since things are reversed, it's left turns that are the friendly ones that don't require crossing oncoming lanes, though i also had to keep in mind that turning on red lights was not allowed.

as i followed other cars in random directions and avoided right turns as much as i could, my friend in the passenger sheet fiddled with the navigation in the car, trying to get it to direct us in the right dirction. i was insistent that he make sure the route avoided expressways, for those unaware japan's nationwide expressway network is almost entirely toll roads and they're fairly expensive, the toll driving from tokyo to osaka is about as expensive as the equivalent shinkansen ticket. it's pretty insane if you think about it, it's like if the whole interstate highway network in the US was tolledas far as i know, the reason it's like this is because during the bubble era construction boom the government went into a lot of debt in order to way overbuild the expressway system, spending millions to extend it even to far-flung parts of the country with no expenses spared, driving on them you'll notice that they never hold back with fancy tunnels and bridges (though to be fair japan is so mountainous that it's frequently a requirement). the usage rates on many parts of the system are not even close to enough to ever break even on the construction or maintenance expense, only a few heavily-trafficked sections inside or between the biggest cities have paid themselves off and now support the rest of the system, with the hope that by 2050 or so the profits from those sections will have been enough to pay off the debt incurred by building out the entire network. interestingly, in order to handle the crippling debt the japanese government did a similar "split up and quasi-privatize" maneuver like they did with JNR, NEXCO was formed in 2005 (the PM at the time, koizumi, pushed a lot of privatization, his signature policy accomplishment was privatizing japan post) as an expressway equivalent to JR, similarly split into regional operating companies, though the government maintained significantly more control over NEXCO.. the infrastructure to support this system is fairly advanced, instead of a mounted transponder almost every japanese car has electronic toll collection (ETC) systems built-in, with card readers you insert your ETC card (basically a special credit card) into before driving (they also talk to you, informing you of your ETC card and toll status and whatnot). obviously i did not have an ETC card and in addition to trying to save money, i really did not want to cause a scene trying to figure out how to pay using a different method at a toll gate, which i'm pretty sure are almost all ETC-only by this point.

i was pretty stressed driving so the atmosphere in the car got quite tense as my friend struggled to get navigation working, i got impatient and snappy with him for being unable to figure out this ONE LITTLE THING while i was over here struggling to keep it together driving for the first time in a foreign country on the WRONG SIDE OF THE ROAD. eventually he gave up and decided he'll just direct me using his phone, but then the car navigation was still spitting out contradictory instructions directing us somewhere unknowable and he couldn't figure out how to turn it off, it was extremely distracting and i could barely handle it on top of everything else. anyways, at a red light i had a crack at it and turned it off in basically ten seconds flat, which certainly didn't help his case...

luckily, i chilled out once we managed to get on the main road out of toyama, it was basically driving straight down a big state highway with occasional traffic lights and random vaguely-industrial businesses along the road like tire shops, i felt like i'd been down this exact road dozens of times in the US (except driving on the opposite side, of course). this is probably a good chance to finally reveal where we were trying to get to: our destination was the "noto peninsula", the thing that looks like a crab claw sticking out into the sea of japan from the top of japan's main island. what possible reason could we have for going out there? it's noto really a hot tourist destination currently, having been hit by a big earthquake last year (that's noto going to stop me of course, a few years ago i booked a trip to maui while the fires were practically still smoldering), though toyama and the noto peninsula were #30 on the 2025 New York Times 52 Places to Go list. now obviously i do noto read the new york times and can't even fully view that page because it's obscured by the paywall... but perhaps it's finally time to come clean and admit that i got a lot of inspiration for the chubu trip itinerary from the site of the guy who submitted that entry to the list, a certain C**** M**, who usually uses his annual submission to evangelize underrated midsized cities in japan. although i find his writing style and many of his interests insufferable (jazz clubs and third-wave coffee, ugh), we can agree on walking excessive distances and visiting places off the beaten path, which is why i mined old issues of his newsletter for travel inspiration. for instance, i would have never heard of the "nakasendo" if it hadn't been for him, he also recommended kanazawa as sort of the thinking man's kyoto, though i am giving myself most of the credit for kanazawa because it's been on my radar for years, i scoped it out and pinned it as a potential stop on the planning map for my 2019 trip.

anyways, one thing he'd recommended is "book a car in toyama and drive up the noto peninsula", which was perfect because i had been on the lookout for somewhere to do the car trip i'd promised my friend. the problem was, he offered absolutely no guidance about where to go or what to do there, "just drive up there and vibe dude, be sure to contribute to the local economy that desperately needs money for disaster recovery!". our navigation was set to take us to nanao, the largest city on the peninsula, and beyond there, who knew? the turn-off for the road going up to the noto peninsula and nanao was near takaoka, after that the traffic died down considerably (and so did my anxiety), i guess noto a lot of people were going up there. before long the road grew thinner and started following the shoreline, becoming a nice japanese rural coastline cruise... i wonder if there is such thing as a kei convertible...

we figured nanao would be a good bet for finding some food, unfortunately we hit the city right around the start of the japanese restaurant "dead hours" of 2pm-5pm. instead of staying open all afternoon, in japan local restaurants that serve both lunch and dinner will often close for a couple hours in between the two, which is annoying because back home i got myself into the habit of eating out only in the afternoon in order to avoid crowdsthe only restaurant in the US i've seen do this is a ramen place owned and operated by a japanese guy, he's really going for full authenticity. on a related note, did you know the tokyo stock exchange closes for an hour in the middle of the trading day for lunch?. we parked near nanao station and then walked around, compared to the big cities there was so few people on the streets that it felt completely dead, though there were plenty of cars driving by on the road in both directions. eventually, we found a noodle joint that closed at 3 instead of 2, though who knows if that'll last because we were the only customers at that time. while we waited for our food, hoping for some travel ideas i picked up a flyer by the register for regional vtuber "yuusha noto", apparently this is the new regional tourism promotion fad (i don't think it's going to work because people who watch vtubers don't go outside). none of yuusha noto's recommendations really piqued our interest, so instead we defaulted to making our next destination this picturesque offshore rock/island i had seen at the bottom of a "visit ishikawa" poster in kanazawa station, according to google maps the island was conveniently located close to the tip of the peninsula and thus would require driving up nearly the entire coast.

⊕i would be remiss if i didn't mention at some point that we also stopped by the "ika no eki", where a community scandalously squandered its covid relief funds building a giant fiberglass squid statue. we had some trouble finding it because i initially thought it was an actual rail station of some sort and so that's what i directed my friend to look for in google maps. i don't have much to say about it, the mall and visitor's center around it was pretty much abandoned, maybe it was because it was late or because tourists are avoiding noto.past nanao we took a quick detour through noto island, which seems to harbor nothing but thick forest and a big country club. still, for whatever reason it's linked to the mainland by two landmark bridges less than 10km apart (typical japanese overbuilding) so you can drive through on the way up the peninsula without backtracking. on the island is where road conditions really started to deteriorate due to the effects of the earthquake, from then on it was like driving through one giant construction site, i got a taste of basically every variety of japanese road construction barricade that exists and began to regret everything, it was one of the worst location you could imagine for a first driving experience, like immediately skipping to the boss level. i felt that the quality of the roads in the wake of the quake had been seriously misrepresented by certain individuals attempting to promote tourism to the area...

we made it to our goal just before sundown, in the excitement i parked in the first viable parking spot nearby that in retrospect seemed to have been numbered and reserved for one of the units in temporary housing nearby, maybe for displaced residents or temporary workers there for the reconstruction effort. on the shore by the island was your typical shabby japanese coastal park, except that in addition to the inevitable progress of time this one had also been ravaged by japan's deadliest earthquake since 2011. although by now it was hard to see raw earthquake damage in most of the peninsula unless you were really looking for it, the park had understandably been lowest priority for clean-up and so still looked like it had been barely touched since the earthquake, the most that had been done was roping off the most dangerous parts, toppled monuments lay where they had fallen and various tiles where the receding tsunami waters had left them.

⊕the rock/island itself, mitsukejima, had been a victim of the earthquake too, rock slides had substantially diminished its presence and it barely looks like the promotional photos anymore. its cliffs no longer rose dramatically out of the water anymore like the sides of a tall ship, instead the rubble that had slid off the top had piled up at its base, forming a ramp-like shore around the island. it's much less striking now, and might as well just be another random little offshore island or rock, it certainly didn't feel like a fitting end point for an epic day-long journey to the tip of the peninsula. a google review in english i saw laments the current state of the island, saying it's "crumbling and in total disrepair" and calling for its restoration, as if they can just go out there and glue all the fallen rocks back to the top. but you know, maybe they can figure something out using a little concrete... in fact, this would have NEVER happened had they properly shored up the cliffs with some concrete casings in the first place...

it was getting late and we hadn't eaten all day, so as the sun was on its way down we looked for somewhere to get dinner. the good thing about being in the middle of nowhere is that you don't have to agonize over restaurant choices because you only have like three options. we backtracked down the coast to go to this curry place by a little cove we'd passed by earlier with another scenic little coastal island that in the fading light honestly looked better than the current mitsukejima. the curry shop was on the second floor of a building on the opposite side of the street from the cove, in a space that had clearly been a classic showa-era kissaten before its current curry shop incarnation (though many kissa serve curry too). it had big landscape windows with a stunning view of the picturesque island outside, now lit up in the dark by lighting pointed at it from on landthe owner later told us this view was only a recent development, up until a month ago there had been a big building in the way that had just been demolished after sustaining severe damage in the earthquake. i guess even such a big disaster can have a silver lining...⊕it's noto a REAL kissa without the vintage ucc ice coffee wallscroll... i wish i could get one of these. it was around 6 pm (it gets dark early in japan) and there wasn't a single other customer there, just the duo running the restaurant, a pair of japanese guys around our age who were the youngest people we'd seen all day in noto.

the main guy worked diligently preparing our food after we ordered, but when his work was done and the food was served he immediately initiated a conversation with us. he was impressed with my japanese, but switched to english after a bit so that my friend could understand too. for somebody in the deep inaka his english ability was exceptionally jouzu, and as he revealed his astonishing backstory we learned how he'd gotten so good: he had ridden a push-scooter across australia (south-north along the east coast, noto through the outback) camping out and couchsurfing at the houses of kind strangers. apparently he'd done it to get over his "social anxiety", and along the way he managed to pick up quite a bit of english. he also mentioned he'd been to every prefecture in japan, and he showed us a video of an appearance on aussie tv with a brief sizzle real that hinted at other exploits too like a short clip of paragliding or something. how did someone like that end up in the middle of nowhere on the noto peninsula running a curry shop? well, i dunno, if you think about it it makes sense that somebody with a reputation for doing crazy things would do something crazy like that...

as we finished up our meal, the shop owner informed us they also had karaoke and of course i could noto resist the offer, even though we still had a lot of driving left that day. i immediately requested a beer (essential for karaoke) to get ready, but my friend was a bit wary because i still had to drive later and legally i was the only one allowed to drive. he grudgingly consented after i assured him that i'd be fine after having just eaten such a big meal, plus going hard in karaoke would sober me up as i burn all the alcohol for fuelthe shop owner also said we could sleep on the beach outside, unfortunately i'm noto that hardcore, also i know for a fact i could noto have gotten to sleep outside because even at night it was still way too hot and humid. the shop owner handed me the karaoke tablet to select a song and i declined any assistance with it, i knew what i was doing. i am sure when he handed it to me the very last thing they expected to see me queue up was Wink / 愛が止まらない ～Turn it Into Love～, the original version with the music video is ALWAYS available in karaoke. it's good to have a couple classic japanese songs ready to go for karaoke in polite company, bonus points if it's something vintage. i got up and delivered a passionate performance dancing around the shop (the karaoke system was hooked up to three different tvs) while the two guys running the shop enthusiastically clapped along in equal parts hype and total disbelief at what they were witnessing. it was definitely one of the peak moments of the entire trip...

driving back at night, we were treated to a spectacular light show as every construction site we'd passed through earlier suddenly turned into a display of lights flashing in various colors, patterns, and orientations, in addition to the flashing warning lights permanently installed along curves and such. the warning lights were excessive to the point that they became counterproductive, i had trouble focusing on the road because random warning lights were constantly trying to direct my attention to things that didn't really matter. my friend also announced at some point that google maps was saying some of the roads were closed at night due to construction and that we should take the expressway, which he swore up and down was actually free. i didn't believe him until i pulled off to the side of the road to research it myself, turns out the expressway segment in noto had been constructed by an independent company that had gone bankrupt before completing it, ownership had passed to the government which made it free. just to be sure, i scoped out the interchanges on google maps and it did appear that they weren't equipped with tolling facilities, so i approved usage of the expressway.

but, we immediately ran into trouble: the first expressway onramp we encountered was blocked by a wall of flashing lights and barricades, i diverted and went off in another direction. the stress was making the atmosphere in the car tense again, my friend objected "what are you doing??? that was the expressway entrance back there!", i replied "we can't take it, it's CLEARLY closed for construction work!". he refused to believe this, arguing "google maps and the NEXCO central website both say NOTHING about a road closure!" and i may have said "you FOOL why do you keep trusting google maps after it has been wrong so many times, plus the noto expressway isn't even operated by NEXCO!!!" eventually we pulled off by a warning sign that seemed to say something about the road work which i laboriously translated (place names are hard), it seems that a large portion of the expressway was closed between two specific interchanges. but the problem was, the road going down the coast was ALSO closed for construction work that night, so it looked like we might be stuck on the noto peninsula all night... trying to sleep in the cramped kei car... or perhaps on the beach. then, we discovered that there was one single route still open: the road closures could all be bypassed by going through noto island, across the same route we'd taken over the two big bridges earlier. i didn't mention this but there was actually construction on one of the bridges too, it was one-lane only for most of its length and you had to wait at an automated traffic light on a five-minute timer (ran into many of those around noto), during which i got out and took the picture at the top of this post...