D1 towards Matsumoto

Route: Kazunumabudokyo to Lake Suwa
Bicycle: 110 km
Train: 130 km
Average Speed: 17.3 km/h
Total Ascent: 1470 m
Weather: sunny and fresh, with a feisty headwind all day, 17 C

It’s a long weekend in Japan and I added an other 2 PTO days making it a super long weekend. 

Before it gets too cold, I decided to come to Nagano Prefecture. This time, not so much around Nagano city, but in the valley of Matsumoto instead. Today I got up before 5 o’clock in the morning, in order to take a train to Takao around 5:30, and then from there another train to Yamanashi Prefecture. I started my ride at Kazunumabudokyo, a train station, just at the entrance of the valley of Kofu, from where one has a very nice view over the entire valley and the vineyards.

I had been here last year in the summer, with a group from Meetup by train, where we visited together some vineyards, actually, not really a vineyard, but a field of grapes, where one could pluck ones own grapes and eat them there. Before that I had absolutely no idea that the region around Kofu is famous in Japan for its wine.

Initially, it was all downhill, until reaching Ryuo from where, unfortunately it is all uphill and a lot of uphill, as you can see from the Strava, nearly 1400 m of elevation. And that’s because although on Google maps all this looks like one big valley, it actually isn’t and one has to cycle up to the lower slopes of Yatsugadake, literally a mountain with 8 peaks, and definitely a majestic one.

I’m still amazed by the amount of mountains everywhere, and took way too many pictures of mountains, which truth to be told, as pictures don’t look so impressive. 

As impressive as these mountains may be, none that overbearing like Fujisan. Even from deep and Yamanashi prefecture, at Fujimi, you can see clearly in the distance Mount Fuji topping every single mountain around it, and standing in solitude.

All that climbing, albeit gradually, was a lot of climbing and I came up to an elevation of over 1000 m but one is still being surrounded by mountains and it feels like cycling actually in the valley. It also wasn’t only all the climbing there was also a fierce headwind the entire day. So I have clearly gained my relax time now in the onsen of my Ryokan here in Matsumoto.

Originally, my plan was to cycle all the way to Matsumoto, which is about 130 km and sounded kind of doable when I was planning the long weekend. But also, I got a pretty early start, I was not able to finish the right, so instead, I changed my endpoint to Lake Suwa, which has a nice cycling lane around most of the lake, and even from there when can see Mount Fuji in the distance. Admittedly, in real life, it looked bigger and way more visible, than on this photo.