History
Ehime occupies Shikoku’s northwestern corner, and its best-known attractions span an unusually wide range — an ancient hot spring, a century-old novel, and a 21st-century cycling route that draws an entirely different kind of visitor than either.
Ehime and the wider world
The Shimanami Kaido is Ehime’s clearest modern connection to the international travel world: since opening in 2006 for cyclists (the final link in a longer expressway that had been built in stages since the 1970s), the route’s combination of dedicated cycling lanes, six distinct bridge crossings, and small-island scenery has drawn repeated recognition from international cycling publications and outlets like CNN as one of the best cycling routes anywhere, pulling in cycling tourists from well beyond Japan specifically to ride it.
Matsuyama’s literary connection runs in a different direction: Natsume Soseki, who would go on to become one of modern Japan’s most important novelists (his face appeared on the 1,000-yen note for two decades), spent a year teaching English in Matsuyama in the late 1890s. He turned the experience into “Botchan,” a wry, still widely read 1906 novel about a brash young Tokyo teacher clashing with rural Matsuyama — the book is now so closely associated with the city that a Botchan-branded steam locomotive still runs through central Matsuyama as a tourist attraction.
Neighbors: Ehime and the rest of Shikoku
Ehime shares the Shikoku Henro pilgrimage circuit with its three island neighbors, and its Shimanami Kaido physically ties it to Hiroshima’s Onomichi across the water — one of the few direct physical links between Shikoku and Honshu that doesn’t run through Kagawa.
Getting there and getting around
Matsuyama Airport has domestic flights from major cities; Matsuyama Station is reached from Okayama by limited express train in about 2.5-3 hours. A rental bicycle (with drop-off points along the route) is the standard way to do the Shimanami Kaido.
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