JAPAN Matsuyama, where we stayed with friends at the beginning and the end of our two-week trip, is a coastal city of about 500,000 people on the island of Shikoku in Japan. It's at about the same latitude as Charleston, South Carolina.    From Matsuyama we took a ferry to Kyushu, and our bike trip followed a C-shaped route (shown in yellow) on the northern half of that island.    We covered 412 miles by bike in 10 biking days, averaging 41 miles per day, staying mostly at youth hostels and carrying our gear in panniers on our bikes. One rainy day we traveled by train, from Takeo to Nagasaki (train route shown in purple), and we had a rest day at Jigoku Onsen near Mount Aso.    PREVIOUS PAGE TABLE OF CONTENTS NEXT PAGE