You also asked about the glass-bottomed boats. You'll probably need to change buses at the base of the Ashizuri peninsula. From there you take a bus west to Takatsushi. There's a strange building there called "Ashizuri Kaiteikan", you can see a picture at

http://www.gallery.or.jp/~hatamap/kankou/area-g/hkg020-e.html

If you go on the glass-bottom boats then make sure to bring Dramamine, if the waves are even a little bit choppy it gets very rough and everyone on my boat was feeling sick afterwards. Also, if the water is choppy they won't go out very far which happened when I was there and was a letdown. Even so I could see the coral, see urchins, and many of the tropical things.

If you skip the glass bottomed boats and come out here in the morning (for example leaving Nakamura early) then you can easily see the Cape in one day. If you go to the glass boats and some of the other sites you may have a hard time mainly because there are so few buses.

Another thing you may be interested in is Kayaking in the Shimanto River. You could go to the same place I visited in Nishi-Tosa-Mura. The train is on the line between Uwajima and Kubogawa / Kochi, the station is Ekawasaki which is about halfway between Uwajima and Kubogawa. The scenery in the area is beautiful and the train runs along the bottom of the valley so even if all you skip the Kayaking and just take the train ride through the valley the scenery's still very nice. In addition to renting a Kayak you can go "Touring" which means that they'll give you a Kayak lesson in the morning and then in the afternoon you go around 8 kilometers downstream in the Kayak, all in a group with instructors to help out where the river gets choppy. That was $50 for the full day. You can rent a tent and camping spot for $30 (a 6 person tent so that's especially good for groups) or only $3 per person for the camping spot if you already have a tent. If you're interested in going here I can send you a map and highlight the route, you're unlikely to find any English speakers at the station and it's about a half mile or so to the "Kanuu-kan"(Canoe Cabin) so a map might be a good thing to have.

You can find some pictures and brief summaries (in English) of the things around Ashizuri and the Canoe place at :

http://www.gallery.or.jp/~hatamap/kankou/area-e/hke010-e.html
http://www.gallery.or.jp/~hatamap/kankou/area-g/hkg010-e.html

There's also phone numbers and short summaries of several places at :

http://www.attaka.or.jp/english/sight.htm
(check the "Western Sightseeing Spots" section)

Of course, even if you call the numbers there's no guarantee you'll get an English speaker.

Another plus about trying this would be that you could go to Uchiko, like you mentioned. I didn't go there but looking at the summary in the Lonely Planet Guide makes it sound like a place I went to in Nagano called Tsumago (also in Lonely Planet under "Tsumago", "Kiso River", or "Magome", I forget which). I liked seeing all the Edo Era (100+ years ago) stuff, you'll be disappointed in Japan to see how little of those kinds of things are still remaining.

If you want to see something strange you could go to the "Sex Museum" in Uwajima. Some friends went to it and had some wierd pictures of giant phalluses and such but I'm sure it would get tiring quickly. Although I imagine the modern place is just a kinki museum, it is said that temples in Japan used to have lots of this in the past so I suppose the current place could be said to have some legitimacy.

(08808)2-1111 (that's 011-81-8808-2-1111 from the US)

You can call them but I doubt anyone will know English. The pamphlet is very nice and also has descriptions in English of many of the sites, if you want I can Xerox it and send it to you, but unfortunately the English is only site descriptions so it won't help you much in planning where to stay, etc. There's also a very detailed map of Shikoku in the pamphlet, but again everything is in Japanese so unless you can read Japanese it won't do you much good. If you want to give the map of Shikoku and Cape Ashizuri a look then check the Map of Western Shikoku and Map of Cape Ashizuri I scanned into the computer. I marked the main places in English since you probably won't understand the Japanese.

A site that tells a lot of things about Kochi Prefecture in English is :

http://www.kochi-ct.ac.jp/tourism/

Also check some of the links at ;

http://www.pref.kochi.jp/~kokusai/index.html

which is made by foreigners living in Kochi. Lots of interesting info but not much seems particularly relavant to travelers.

Unfortunately neither of these two seem to have hotel lists in English.

By far the easiest and best way to get around Shikoku is by car, as you'll see from the options I list below it can be very difficult to get around any other way because for the most part Shikoku is rugged countryside with a lot of mountains. That does make for nice viewing but if you don't have a car it means it's hard to get to many of the nicer places. On the other hand if you opt for a car be warned that almost all expressway / freeways in Japan are toll roads, gas is similar in price to Europe rather than America (ie. perhaps more than $3 per gallon), and at least in the major cities parking is expensive and hard to get. I don't know which roads in Shikoku are toll roads, in general there are normal roads you can take they'll just be much slower. As for parking, Shikoku is countryside and around Ashizuri I saw a lot of empty parking lots so there should be plenty of space.

If you don't use a car and you come from the north probably the easiest way is to take the train (JR) from Matsuyama to Uwajima from which there's a bus to Cape Ashizuri. I didn't take that bus so I don't know how long it takes, the two cities are pretty far apart so there may be only a few buses a day and take at least 3-4 hours or so. None of the buses around Cape Ashizuri are operated by JR so you'll have to pay for the bus segment.

A scenic but much slower route from Matsuyama is to take JR to Uwajima and change trains there to the JR line that runs through the Shimanto River Valley. When you get to Kubokawa station (a few hours) you change to a private train line (maybe Kuroshio, I forget) to Nakamura and finally take the bus from there to Ashizuri. Sounds like a hassle I know but the scenery in the Shimanto River Valley is beautiful and you won't regret seeing it. Be forwarned that trains and buses are few and far apart so before taking this route you should buy the JR timetable available at any train station in Japan and plan the transfer times well. The private train and Nakamura -> Ashizuri bus are not JR so you'll have to pay around $4 for the train and $15 for the bus each way.

An easier option than these is to come from Kochi in the East. From there you can take a JR Express train to Nakamura and then the bus to Cape Ashizuri. The last segment of the train route passes over a private train line even though you don't change trains, so you may have to pay a supplement on top of the JR train pass, the bus is also not JR so you'll have to pay.

Another option for those coming from Kochi is to take the express bus from Kochi to Ashizuri. You don't change buses so you won't have to worry about long connection times or catching the wrong bus / train. However the bus is not JR so you'll have to pay the $50+ fare each way.

http://www.kochi-ct.ac.jp/tourism/transportation.html

tells all the buses and public transport in Kochi Prefecture, including the Express bus and also a Seasonal Bus Tour leaving Nakamura to see Cape Ashizuri. But I'm sure it'll be all in Japanese and will be very rushed, probably not much fun.

If you aren't starting in Shikoku but coming from Osaka or Tokyo then there's a much easier way to get to the Cape, by ferry from Osaka. It leaves around 11pm from Osaka Port (you can get there by subway) and arrives around 9am so you can sleep through the long trip. You can then take your time heading North through the Shimanto River Valley on the way to Matsuyama or East towards Kochi. The ferry's fare is ~$60 and isn't covered by the JR Pass.

If all you need is phone numbers then check :

http://www.pref.kochi.jp/~kankou/navs2i.htm

The first block of perhaps a dozen numbers are all places in Cape Ashizuri. As your computer probably doesn't show Japanese and you probably can't read it anyways then you won't be able to see the hotel names, but at least you'll have numbers to call to try and make arrangements. Be forewarned that the phone numbers are listed as if you're calling from Japan, but from foreign countries don't dial the leading 0. For example if you call the "Ashizuri Pacific Hotel", a hotel located somewhat near the Cape Ashizuri bus station, the number listed is 08808-8-1111 but from the US you would dial 011-81-8808-8-1111 (81 is Japan's Country Code).

Another possibility is to stay in a "Business Hotel" in Nakamura and then take the bus in the morning out to Ashizuri and back again at night. There are several Business Hotels near the train station in Nakamura and they cost around 5000 yen per night per person. Business Hotels are basically just normal hotels and are clean, but the rooms are small and it's quite possible you'll need to use a "Yokujyou" (large bath that everyone uses, common in tourist spots or cheap hotels).

Last but not least, if you haven't got your plane ticket then I can recommend some travel agencies. Check the ones on my home page

Travel in Japan

as they're probably much cheaper than what you'll find from a normal agency. And don't forget to get a JR Train Pass, it'll save you a of money if you use the trains much.