Bicycle: 19 km
Train: 1200 km
Riding time:
Weather: very sunny and probably around 27C
Starting my week of spring vacation. This year not precisely Golden Week, but the week after as my colleague wanted to take GW.
Today was dedicated to getting to the starting point: Kumamoto. I left home around 7:30 to be at Tokyo station around 8:30 and have enough time to pack up the bike, buy breakfast and lunch for a 6 h journey, and be the first in queue for my seat. I had a reserved seat, mandatory now for Nozomi Shinkansen during high peak travel season.
Originally I wanted to pack up my bike with both wheels removed, but it turned out, that I was incapable of removing the rear wheel. I tried it at home, so no panic when I got to Tokyo station. Luckily there was one person in the baggage seat row who didn’t have baggage so we were only in 2 with oversized baggage which meant that there was more than enough space for my bike.
Kumamoto is far from Tokyo and flying would seem the more reasonable way to get here, but flight tickets aren’t cancellable, while train tickets are. I had reserved hotels in Kyushu but also reserved alternative hotels in Tohoku and Nara prefecture many months ago that could be cancelled until a few days prior to departure. On Wednesday this week I looked at the weather forecast: Weather for this week looks ok for most days, except Monday which will be very rainy. So likely a day for relaxing in an onsen.
While today it was brilliant weather everywhere but I was sitting in the train for most of it.
Once in Kumamoto it was actually to late to visit anything, but I still went to the castle, took a few pictures and relaxed in the park under a huge , old tree writing some delayed blog posts of recent rides.
The castle was damaged 8 years ago by a massive earthquake and is now under reconstruction.
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