D3 - back from Kawaguchiko towards Tokyo

Route: Kawaguchiko - Otsuki
Bicycle: 29 km
Train: 80 km
Total ascent: 206 m
Average speed: 15.2 km/h
Riding time: 1:55
Weather: very sunny and hot, 29C

I had so many plans how to return from Kawaguchi to Tokyo:

• through Doshi michi to Hashimoto
• over Ashigara pass to  ShinMatsuda
• over Nagao pass and Kintaro Hakone line to ShinMatsuda
• ...

But finally none of them were put into action due to the heat. While yesterday the temperature was perfect for climbing up Mt. Fuji today it was definitely too hot to enjoy cycling. I got side tracked early on in my route to Yamanakako by the clearly visible Fuji and the pagoda... so I went first to the pagoda to get an iconic picture.

As an iconic place it gets a lot of tourists. But today at least there was a very clear view of Mt. Fuji. Yet some tourists complained that the place was overrated. Well, I guess if you are by train or by car, it is quite cumbersome to come here, just for one picture, but as a cyclist it is kind of okay. I wouldn't go out of my way to come here... but I was in the area anyway. 

But the better view I had on my roll down towards Otsuki at this rice field reflecting Mt. Fuji: 

Otherwise the ride was eventless. I have done this ride down to Otsuki already a number of times... So far I only managed once to cycle back from Mt. Fuji in a meaningful way (I cycled down to the city of Fuji on the Pacific coast), but else I always took a train or just rolled down to Otsuki. I really want to get over Mikuni pass some day. But today was not the day and I was happy with my decision to just get down to Otsuki and home early. It even allowed me to do some gardening tasks in the afternoon in Tokyo and some other things at home on my day off. 

GW2026 D2 my mother was right - Hagi 😍

Route: in and around Hagi
Bicycle: 39 km
Total ascent: 352 m
Average speed: 11,8 km/h
Riding time: 2:50 h 
Weather: Sun and clouds, 25 C

My mother has been enchanted by Hagi ever since she visited in 1995. And she was right! Hagi is a wonderful , traditional Japanese town . One of the few not destroyed by development. Actually probably the biggest that still feels quite traditional but is also alive. 

Some other much smaller examples I could think of are: Imaicho (but MUCH smaller), Magome (much smaller and now totally overrun by tourists wanting to “hike” between Magome and Tsumago). But I don’t really know any other town even somewhat similar to Hagi. 

I started the day at Hagi castle. Surprisingly one is allowed to ride inside the castle remains with a bicycle. Not sure if this was a good idea. Anyway, from the castle little remains just the moat…

.. and a shrine built by the townspeople after the castle had been torn down in admiring memory of their local daimyo now powerless, at least officially. 

There was also a rather nice garden around a tea house with Rhododendron in full bloom.

With the castle entrance fee one also gets entrance to a samurai building just outside of the castle, which however, was rather disappointing. Allegedly it’s the biggest remaining samurai building in Hagi, but it is just a row of tatami rooms.

From there, I cycled through the old part of the town, which is characterized by long walls on both sides of the road, old  residences, and a surprising amount of gardens, specially gardens with citrus fruits.Hagi is famous for summer mandarins (夏みかん). My mother even brought one of them back from her trip to Tokyo and she still remembers, I don’t.

In the old part of the town, I visited the most famous residence: The house of the Kikuya clan. Apparently, they started out as samurai, but then lost their master, and with that their status as samurai. From there they evolved into merchants, which was the lowest rank in Japanese society back then. But that didn’t impede them to become extremely wealthy, and well liked by the local daimyo and construct a huge house with an even larger garden.

After pottering a little bit more through the old streets, and passing by the Meirin Gakusha, an enormous, wooden school building from the Meiji era, now tourist information center.

From there I rode to the south and tip of the town, had lunch at a typical Japanese coffee shop run by an elderly lady who has a few home-cooked meal options. Close by it was another typical residence of Hagi along a small channel that even flows through the house and was used for cleaning the dishes , washing vegetables and as water source for the bath tub. 

It also had a nice tea room with the best view of the garden with a pond from the same small river. There was an elderly volunteer guide with whom I had a nice conversation about how my mother loved Hagi when she visited 31 years ago and how probably not a lot has changed since. There are tourists in Hagi, including some tourist groups. But even at the highlights, the Kikuya residence, there was always a lot of space around to visit calmly. It seems the city gets exactly the right amount of tourists for keeping the local tourism industry afloat, but not having any signs of over tourism. And I guess as long as Hagi remains off the Shinkansen network it will remain this way. Already now the majority of tourist don’t venture beyond Hiroshima. So going to Yamaguchi and then taking a bus over the mountains to Hagi would seem to most tourists like beyond even the unbeaten track. I’m definitely going to come back, maybe on a trip along the entire sea of Japan side.

The Yukawa residence, was the last residence of the day, from here on to a shrine, a temple, two UNESCO world heritage sites, a volcano, a forest and an onsen with a wide view! 

But let’s go in order. First the shrine of Shoin a famous teacher, who also gave his name to the biggest shrine close to my house where he is buried. 

The next stop was a temple: Tokoji. With so few visitors that the admission fee is self service, meaning that there is a box and a sign how much you should put in the box. The temple itself is big and has a grandiose approach, …

… but the really interesting part is the mausoleum for the Mōri family, the local daimyos.

But there was more to come. The next two stops were UNESCO world Heritage sites. The sites belonging to the industrialization under the Meiji revolution have become UNESCO world Heritage sites a few years ago to recognizing the achievement of the Meiji era to industrialize Japan without being colonized and with speed. 

The two sites in Hagi I visited are a wharf and an iron furnace. Of the wharf the only remains are a sea wall: 

Of the furnace , which actually never worked, more is remaining: 

From here I went to a small peninsula from where one has a wide view over the bay. 

But one can also go down inside the caldera of a cute small volcano:

I even went a bit further on that peninsula to a camellia grove, which however (not surprisingly) had already lost all its flowers. 

Now the last remaining activity of the day was a good soak in the onsen of yet another hotel with a rotenburo from where to enjoy the view over the bay. (Picture below is NOT from the rotenburo but from the top of the mountain.). The view from the onsen was a bit less spectacular but still nice. Down onto a port and the mountains in the background.

Finally back to town, to a wash saloon where I washed and dried my cycling clothes while having ramen in a nearby shop and on the way back got some breakfast items for tomorrow.  I’ll already be leaving Hagi and ride along the coast to the West.

GW2025 D9 exploring around Himeiji

Route: Himeiji to Engyoji (and back home)
Bicycle: 27 km 
Ropeway: 400 m 
Train: 580 km
Total ascent: 200 m?
Average speed: 11,2 km/h
Riding time: 2:27 h
Weather: grey but no rain. Neither warm nor cold, 20 C

I didn’t really have a plan for my last day of Golden Week. At some point I had planned to go from Shodoshima to Okayama and then ride the last day to Himeji (from where my train return ticket was). But when I discovered that there was a direct ferry from Shodoshima to Himeji I changed that plan. The ride Okayama to Himeji ( if done on potentially nice roads along the coast) was likely going to be too long for safely catching a train back home.

So instead I was already in Himeji, without a plan. Yesterday on the ferry I checked what is famous around Himeji and a temple on a mountain came up (and obviously the castle). And yes, this temple was very nice. Perked on top of a small mountain right behind Himeji , surrounded by nature. 

There didn’t seem to be a way up by bicycle so instead I took the rope way. From the top station it is about 1 km of walk to get to the sprawling temple complex. 

It reminded me a lot of Mount Hiei close to Kyoto, but I think this temple was even more quaint although it did have tourists. Including a very noisy group of elderly Spanish tourists. 

On the way to the mountain, I did pass below Himeji castle and took a picture, but had no plan to actually visit it. I have been 30 years ago… and apparently no strong inkling to go back. 

And with that an other Golden Week has finished and I am in the Shinkansen back home. My original ticket was for around 18:00 but I could easily change it for a 15:00 departure including space behind my seat for the bike. 

GW2025 D5 a bit of everything

Route 1: small round of Naoshima
Route 2: Takamatsu - temple 82 - 81- back to Takamatsu 
Bicycle: 63 km
Ferry: 32 km
Total ascent: 907 m
Riding time: 4:54 h
Weather: sunny but not hot, 20C

With everything ongoing at work, and with building the house, I didn’t have a lot of time to organize this Golden Week trip. I reserved the hotels a few weeks ago, but that was about it. So I didn’t realize that for the museums in Naoshima, one now needs a reservation. So when I finally checked yesterday evening, I saw that there was no more reservations possible for the entire week. Luckily I didn’t go yesterday in the rain, hoping to be able to see museums. It is likely I wouldn’t have been able to access them. There are a few that during the art triennial are accessible without reservation, but they also run a reservation program at the same time, so probably if you turn up without a reservation you’re just stuck in a long queue waiting. In the rain.

So I went today in perfect weather conditions, however, my bicycle wasn’t in perfect conditions. I noticed in the morning that the rear tire had only a little bit of air left in. Luckily, there was a bike shop right in front of my hotel which left the pump outside on the pavement. So I filled the tube there, cycled to the port, took the ferry over to Naoshima, but by the time I arrived on the island, the tire was very soft again. I got a pump at one of the bicycle rental shops in the harbor, but also had a look at the tire and it was clear that this tire hadn’t a hole, rather it lacked the rubber from too much riding.

So I just did a quick round of Naoshima, to the few pieces of art that are actually accessible on a day where all the museums are closed. These were the same pieces of art I already saw back in 2016 when I was here for the first time. Back then no reservation for any of the museums was needed. I just remember that we were waiting in a small queue in front of one art exhibit, but that was about it. And that was also in the middle of golden week. So clearly this art triennial has taken off in popularity, plus there are many more international visitors to Japan and this area.

Naoshima is probably best known for its “pumpkins” designed by Kusama Yayoi.

Pumpkin 1:

Pumpkin 2: 

And even a “traffic” sign for the pumpkin:

Next time I come to Naoshima I must be better prepared with reservations for some of the museums. Probably it is better to visit the island outside of the triennial.

While on the island, I called a bicycle shop in the harbor of Takamatsu and confirmed that they would be able to replace the tire. After my quick round of the island, I took back an early ship to Takamatsu got the bicycle repaired while I was having lunch at the station.

This left me with the entire afternoon free for another ride. On Shikoku there’s a pilgrimage to 88 temples that are spread around the entire island.When I came to Takamatsu yesterday, I saw that there were two on a mountain just outside of the city, so I planned a ride there.These were temples, 82 and 81.

There was even another pumpkin.

I had actually been to both of these temples nine years ago on my very first trip to Shikoku. Back then we were traveling by car. Actually, I remember letting my ex-husband out at the bottom of a path up to temple number 81, so that he could hike up, while I was driving up. I would not have imagined to ride up this mountain by bicycle back then.

I was actually surprised how many meters of elevation this mountain/hill was. 

On the way down back to the plains, I was rewarded with the spectacular view over towards Sakaide. 

On the ride back to the city, I tried finding smaller roads. In some places I succeeded, in others, not so much.Japan simply outside of the major megalopolis like Tokyo, Osaka, etc., is a car country. We forget that living in Tokyo.

GW2025 D2 Ashimori and Takahashi

Route: Okayama - Ashimori -Takahashi

Bicycle: 70 km
Train: 0 m
Car: 51 km
Total ascent: 987 m
Average speed: 15,4 km/h
Riding time: 4:35 h
Weather: sunny and again not too warm, 20 C

Today was a wonderful day with new discoveries and very relaxing. Now I just need to hope that I’ll be able to make it back to Okayama as I am sitting in a train at Bitchu Takahashi station that isn’t moving because somewhere down the line rocks did fall on the track. I am pondering if I should put the bicycle together back again and ride down to the plain of Okayama. However even Soja is 30 km away, it’s already 18:00 and it seems that trains from Soja are also not moving. Probably because the trains from Takahashi don’t arrive. The other passengers are sitting relaxed, and I have still the blog post of yesterday to write, so I am sitting here as well … However, after an announcement saying that the responsible JR person would be at the site of the rock at 19:00 to check it out, instead I decided to take the bike and just when I had it all assembled again a man who was going to take the train as well approached me and offered to take me by car. So here we go. By car to Okayama.  

The car ride itself was also a great experience. Obviously I was a bit conscious of the fact that I am boarding a car of a totally unknown man. But , well, most people in the world are good people. And he was definitely one of them. Surprisingly I had a really good conversation with him. He seemed very well informed about global affairs , the war in Ukraine and just generally an interesting person to talk to about more than just the weather. 

Now back in my hotel , and back to today’s blog post.

Getting out of Okayama wasn’t the best route, but once outside I was on one of cycle paths in the Kibi plain but somewhere took different turns from yesterday and this came to a new place: Ashimori 

I had never heard about this place and even yesterday when I searched for interesting spots around Okayama it did not come up. So I was really lucky to stumble up on it. On my way. A nice small village, largely maintaining its old character of, what I would call, post town. There is an old samurai residence, which I did not visit and a garden that uses the mountains as part of its landscape design. The old lord of the area could sit in his tea house above the small lake and enjoy the breeze and the views.

Before entering into the mountains, I had udon at a local small restaurant, where the owner‘s wife was very eager to speak English and gave me a small cake from the area. From there, it was uphill on a very nice and quiet country road through the lush green vegetation. I’m really surprised how green everything is. Which really I shouldn’t. Japan is a very green country. But somehow this year I didn’t notice the change from winter landscape to the lush green landscape. I’m simply too busy with my house building, that I didn’t have enough time to cycle in the countryside and mountains around Tokyo. So this trip here feels like the first time to really see this abundance of green.

Somewhere in these mountains, there are small hamlets, probably all but destined to disappear in the next 50 years.

And with that I made it to the viewpoint above the castle of Takahashi. 

I didn’t have enough time to visit the castle and the mountain it is on top of looks really steep. I actually visited it eight years ago on my tour through Japan. Back then I took the train from Okayama and then a taxi up to the entrance of the castle. Today instead, I visited a temple, down in the valley, which back then the taxi driver recommended to me, but somehow I hadn’t considered visiting it. The temple itself is probably a pretty normal temple, but the draw of it is it’s Japanese garden.

The Rododendron wasn’t in full bloom yet, but even though this garden was very relaxing and calm.

People always complain or fear how full everything will be in golden week, but it’s so much depends on where you go. Yes the train yesterday was crazy full but today both in Ashimori, and in Takahashi, there were very few people around.It simply isn’t on any major, or even minor routes through Japan, not even for the Japanese.

GW2025 - D1 Kibi plain repeat

Route Okayama - Kibi plain round trip
Bicycle: 61 km
Train: 650 km
Total ascent: 243 m
Average speed: 15,7 km/h
Riding Time: 3:47 h
Weather: very sunny but not THAT warm, 20C

I organized this Golden Week trip maybe about two months ago, right after I found out that this year is again the art triennial in the Setouchi region. And although it is right in the middle of Golden Week, I did have no problems in finding reasonably priced accommodations in the area.

For the first two days, I’m in Okayama, where I have been eight years ago on my big trip through Japan. Today was actually a repeat of a ride that I did back then.

In order to come here, I needed to pass through the craziness of getting on a Shinkansen out of Tokyo on the first official day of Golden Week. The situation at Tokyo station was a well organized chaos. I made it pretty easily to the actual platform, but on the platform there were hoards of people, kept in organized queues by special railway employees.During Golden Week for the Nozomi Shinkansen, all seats are reserved, which means that people who did not get a reservation are all desperate to board a Hikari or Kodama train. So there were long queues on the platform, and the people who were actually there to take their reserved seat in the Nozomi needed to kind of squeeze between everyone else. Even the vending machine was nearly empty, and that at 9 AM in the morning. Luckily, I had bought something for breakfast and lunch at a conbini on the way to Tokyo station, so I didn’t need to get anything from the platform shop. However, once I was in my Nozomi on my reserved seat, I had the space behind the seat for the bicycle and could sit comfortably all the way to Okayama. As there was so much traffic and, probably especially the Hikari and Kodama trains, took more time at the platform to load and unload people, the entire system was in delay. And by the time I reached Okayama, my train already had racked up more than 20 minutes of delay. Even Okayama station was very crowded and we needed to form a line to get out of the turn-still. 

On my way, I had planned the ride for today and tomorrow. Today, a short ride into Kibi plain with its temples, shrines and old tombs. 

The first two stops were too big shrine complexes at the foothill of a small hill. As in the next few days is the children’s day, they were kois flying above in the air. Normally, they should be flying over a river, but here they were flying over the parking lot.

The second shrine per the description had a very special roof, I think if I wouldn’t have read it, I would not consider this roof as anything special, but just a normal shrine roof. But I’m clearly no expert.

As I continued on the cycle path, I continued through the plain with small fields and small hamlets. I had planned a little bit longer ride, but at some point it was getting surprisingly chilly and also a little bit late, that I decided to take a shortcut cut back to Okayama. but while being on my shortcut, I remembered a picture of the main temple of this area with a flower field in front of it. So I checked how far it would be from where I was on my shortcut, and it was within less than 4 km, so I decided to give it a detour. I had been to this temple 8 years ago, but to my surprise I had a new experience today. They were arranging the big drums for a concert in the evening in front of the pagoda in the yard of the temple, and already had some test runs of their performance.

And no, this hill is not a hill, it is actually an ancient tomb. 

D3 Daibutsu and schools

Route: Heguri - Nokogiriyama - Kimitsu

Bicycle: 50 km
Walking: 3 km
Train: 90 km
Total ascent: 750 m+
Average speed: 15,5 km
Riding time: around 5 h
Weather: sunny and warm, but very windy. Mainly tailwind though, 20 C

For my last day in Boso peninsula I went to the other (other than the flowers) famous place: Nokogiriyama and it’s Nihonji temple with an enormous Daibutsu carved out of the rock:

And as a Daibutsu wasn’t enough they threw in a gigantic Kannon as well:

The small buddhas had suffered though under the Meiji restoration when Buddhist figures in some temples were destroyed.

The other theme of the day was schools. I had started my day in a school, …

… but also for lunch I ended up in a school now transformed into a very popular road side station with many small restaurants. I lined up at the most popular which was in an old class room and served nostalgic school lunches. The Japanese families around me all remembered their school days. 

Overall I am not sure how much I like Boso peninsula. It’s relatively hard to reach from my place (2h+ by train), it was very windy and on the road along the shore there is traffic. Nothing really crazy, but not my solitary mountain roads. However truth be told, the mountain roads in the interior were very quiet.