After seeing how far away from Tokyo we could get with 5,000 yen, (US$33.80), the winner of our challenge hits the beach.

The other day, two of our Japanese-language reporters, Mr. Sato and Go Hatori, decided to see how far away from Tokyo they could get with a travel budget of 5,000 yen (US$33.80). Setting out at 9 a.m., Mr. Sato headed west and Go went north, and at 5 p.m., they pulled up Google Maps and measured the total distances they’d traveled from Tokyo Station.

▼ Go and Mr. Sato outside Tokyo Station at the start of the challenge

You can read the full details of their contest here, but Go’s travel budget ran dry at Odaka Station in the town of Minamisoma, Fukushima Prefecture.

However, there were still 20 minutes to go until 5 o’clock, and under the rules Go and Mr. Sato had decided on, after they ran out of money they were still allowed to keep walking to add to their total distance travelled.

Ambling north, Go felt a sense of exhilarating liberation from the crowded conditions of Tokyo, and as he got farther away from Odaka Station, the scenery became even more beautifully bucolic.

Shortly after he crossed over a river bathed in the orange-gold glow of the setting sun, he checked the time and saw that it was now five o’clock.

He pulled up Google Maps to calculate his distance from Tokyo Station, which the app told him was 237 kilometers (147.3 miles). Then he called Mr. Sato, who was in Shizuoka Prefecture, to compare, and when Go found out he’d edged his coworker by four kilometers, he felt an overwhelming rush of joy.

Invigorated by his victory, Go took off running, even though the distance-based competition was now over. Because the competition was done, though, it no longer mattered which direction he ran in, so he decided to run to the beach.

Go had caught a few glimpses of the coast on his train ride up to Odaka Station…

…and from where he was at, it was only about a 30-minute walk to a section called Murakami Beach.

▼ Go, Go!

Thanks to his reenergized swift steps, Go got to the beach while there was still sunlight…

…but it was late enough in the day that he had the place all to himself.

Since Fukushima is on the eastern half of the northern part of Japan’s main island of Honshu, the sun doesn’t set into the sea, so while he’d gotten some great sunset shots on the way here, his pics of the ocean were very blue.

Eventually, it started to get dark, and Go still had a long trip back to Tokyo, so he started the four-kilometer return walk to Odaka Station.

However, the walk quickly turned into a run when Go realized that if he hurried, before going south towards Tokyo he could actually take the train a little farther north (now that he was freed of the constraints of the 5,000-yen travel budget challenge), which would allow him to squeeze in dinner at…

…Sendai, the capital city of Miyagi Prefecture.

▼ When visiting Sendai, most people choose to eat the local specialty of gyutan (beef tongue), but Go can never say no to a plate of high-quality fried rice.

Once he was done eating, it was finally time to hop on the train for the ride back to Tokyo.

Considering he’d started this trip with no advance planning (even the directions he and Mr. Sato went in were decided by a coin flip), it had been an amazing day, and the next time Go is getting on a train or bus in Tokyo, it’s going to be hard to resist the temptation to just keep riding it as far as he can.

Photos ©SoraNews24
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