This blog is about travelling through Japan on a bicycle. Initially on a foldable bicycle (Brompton) and more recently mostly by road bike (Spezialized)... but also by train, ferry, plane, bus or any other transport, if sea, weather, mountains or the like come between me and my desire to ride.
I have tried to summarise information that could be potentially helpful also for other bicycle travellers through Japan, such as list of bicycle roads, helpful web pages etc.
This blog post is about the cute construction side road barriers that I have only seen in Japan
I am pretty sure out there is the world wide web are dedicated pages only to Japanese construction sites, but I took a few pictures of road barrier while riding and wanted to share them for being SOOOO cute.
Unfortunately of the funniest of all I did not get a picture: A Hello Kitty themed fence that was being moved by a large construction worker. But I got in February 2019 an other Hello Kitty fence in a specially ugly construction side:
Here my selection:
Most are animal of some kind...
But there are also some, very polite, humanly formed ones.
Some that have sprung from the pages of a manga:
Or, very correctly, Fuji shaped road cones:
I feel that I took pictures only of a small proportion of Japanese road barriers. Once travelling by car through a very long construction side, there was an entire zoo lined up at the road. Deer, giraffe, monkeys, tigers, elephants, turtles... Sadly I didn't take a picture.
This post is about a few useful Japanese words you might want to be able to read / recognize before starting a bicycle tour through Japan
I don't plan to write all possible words that you might need in Japan as a tourist, as I am sure there are web pages out there, dedicated just to this. I just wanted to upload a few pictures of cycling specific road signs that might be a good idea to be able to read.
Stop signs
Stop signs in Japan are not octagonal, but rather can come in round shapes or just written on the street. Adding to this, they can come written in 3 different scripts: Hiragana alone, Katakana alone or Kanji and Hiragana (and very seldom also Kanji and Katakana).
Hiragana: とまれ
Katakana: トマレ
Kanji & Hiragana: 止まれ
Kanji & Katakana: 止マレ
It all means the same, STOP!
Riding in the other direction in One-way-streets
In general in Japan as a cyclist you are allowed to ride in the opposite direction in one-way-street. There should however always be a sign to actually allow it. It is normally written in kanji (and hiragana) and confusingly enough can come in different wordings.
E.g. 軽車両を除く literally meaning "light vehicles excepted", thus also including other vehicles other than bicycles, 二輪を除く meaning "two wheelers excepted" or the more straightforward 自転車を除く "except bicycles". I guess there can be also other phrases.
Obviously if you are looking at a really big street, then you should always ride on the correct side of the street. But with the many small streets in Japan it is generally perfectly fine to ride in counter sense.
Bicycle parking
Again there are different words, the ones I can think of are: 駐輪場、自転車置き場 both meaning exactly the same. There are other words out there for the same concept as well. It is highly unlikely that they would be written in hiragana or katakana, simply because the words are longer and are directed to a more adult audience, while the "STOP" sign needs to be understood by small children as well, bicycle parking lot isn't so essential.
Bicycle lane
Again, there a different words for that, sometimes it can be quite easily deducted from the sign, other times only something like 自転車道, very literally bicycle lane, can be found. The one below surprisingly was with a pay box (有料) at the end... but that was a very specific bridge close to Kyoto.
These days back in Tokyo for the final removal after 3 years in Japan back to Europe, this time Holland. But luckily I was able to plan the trip right around the January NPC ride. Not having any longer a bicycle in Japan (as I brought the brompton with me back in late November to the Netherlands), I opted for Docomo sharing bikes, now available in many wards of Tokyo, including Shibuya (where the NPC ride starts), Shinjuku (where I was staying my last two days with a friend in Tokyo and Minato, where we finished the nights ride.
This time also 2 colleagues from work and the brother of one of them came along. Everyone on docomo's.
We started in Shibuya in front of the United Nations University, but as I had seen on the Docomo web page that there were only a low number of bicycles available in the area, I decided to ride there from where I was staying. So I picked-up my bicycle in Shinjuku ward and rode leisurely to our starting point. Not so leisurely to actually turn on the electrical motor of the bicycle.
It was the Hatsumode ride, so included visits to two shrines where we paid our respect to the local gods for a happy and successful upcoming year. Atago shrine, the second we visited, is located on the highest hill in all 23 wards of Tokyo!
Before that we had a longer stop at Tokyo station, which just completed its reform. However I did not go an visit the station, but rather changed my bicycle. I hadn't used my battery until then, as it was very low, but even without using it, it was running out of energy. And the impractical feature is that if you want light, you need to switch the motor on. No motor, no light... which also means that from Tokyo station onwards I had this gentle and somewhat awkward push while riding. Nothing to be done about that.
We finished our ride under Tokyo tower and then discussed where to go for some warm dinner.
As so often (I hadn't really thought about it before someone said it), we finished going to a Chinese place... This time a Taiwanese restaurant, where we had "my" shinnenkai only a few days earlier. But it was in a convenient location (including a Docomo docking station) and it did tick the box of "Chinese food".
As I didn't have my garmin with me, I only recorded the ride on "map my ride" and then uploaded it to Strava. Not terribly convenient, also because it drains rapidly the battery of the phone. But here you go!
Strava thought that it would be a good idea to make an animation of the statistics of 2017... well, here you go.
Since I started using Strava, sometime in summer 2017, I have done climbed nearly 10,000 m (I would have never suspected this, as I am so adverse to cycling uphill) and did ride around 2,000 km.
I am sure that Strava will "punish" me this year for not doing another 2 months ride through Japan (or elsewhere), sending me incessant email reminders that I should go out and workout! Grrrrrr!!!
Multiple cycle roads available. They are of varying quality from high speed cycling road along the river between Kyoto and Nara to partly overgrown lanes or gravel. But overall it is a very long cycling trip in which one can use on-and-off cycle lanes.
Good cycling lanes around Lake Biwa, with nice views on the lake and not the typical "river ride".
Specially around Nara there are also a lot of sign posts specifically for cyclists.
Great area with a lot of touristic highlights, even outside the obvious destinations
Small roads with little traffic leading through wonderful country side and well preserved and still functioning villages, including some sightseeing options (temples, shrines...) which are void of tourists.
In the center between Ryotsu and Mano Sado island is quite flat, but for the more ambitious cyclists there are two ranges of mountains on each side of the island to explore.
Here the detailed description of the 4 days touring Sado
Kibi Plain
Reasons:
Well indicated cycling lane through fields and on small rural paths
I originally had decided to go to Tono valley because I heard of a good cycling infrastructure there. Well there is the typical cycle path along a river, however the valley has a lot more to offer, with having small streets with little traffic.
The local tourism office has some maps for suggested rides
Very nice landscape with still a lot of traditional houses
I did not ride INTO Tono valley by bicycles but rather by train (because of hills and of rain), however the part I did cycle up from Shin Hanamaki to Iwanebashi was also nice. No bicycle lane, but not a lot of traffic anyway.
Long totally straight cycling lane out from Tokyo to Sayama Lake used by both neighbourhood cyclists as well as people going more seriously to Sayama Lake
Links to a quite long cycling path out of Tokyo, you can essentially start in Shinjuku (or maybe even before), ride down along Kanda river to Kichijoji, then through small neighbourhood streets until somewhere behind Koganei park, get on the cycling road there (see map in the link below) and then ride slowly up to the lake and make a full round of the lake on the cycling path before returning back to Tokyo.
Cycling along the Pacific from Shizuoka to Irago and on by ferry to Ise.
Reasons:
A long stretch along the Pacific ocean with views of the ocean and farther into Irago peninsula through fields
The one big problem however is the maintenance of this cycle path. Besides a few perfect stretches (like the one leading from somewhere outside of Shizuoka to Omaezaki on an old railway track or the last few kilometers leading to cape Irago) it has a lot of totally overgrown parts that can become totally impassible and specially between Omaezaki and Hamamatsu the sand dunes on the path are a real problem.
Apparently nothing is being done against the vegetation. A bit more is being done against the sand, but for the time being I only saw statements of that something WILL be done, no results yet (unless the path was even worse before)
In this post I list those accommodations where I stayed and that I think I can recommend to other travellers. I have stayed at many others, but those didn't impress me specifically. The list is ordered by region, roughly from North to South.
This is a big chain of business hotels. The rooms are simple but reliable and practically furbished (e.g. there is a washing line in the bathroom). You can get a membership card (I think for 1500 Yen) and then with each overnight stay points are accumulated and after 10 you get one free night. The hotels are normally conveniently located next to major railway stations.
Highlights:
Discount system
Practical rooms
Location:
All over Japan, close to big railway stations in general
I only stayed at one in Kurobe. It seems to be a budget hotel chain mainly catering to car drivers looking for a place to sleep outside of cities but close to major streets. It is sleeping only, with only a minimal service for breakfast. But a conbini most likely wont be too far away to get something else.
This feels like a riders house, at least it is very much geared towards riders of all kind, and the hosts have great interest in all their guests with a nice guest book.
Highlights:
Very good dinner and breakfast
Very friendly host
The rooms are relatively small and dark, but you get the restaurant room to use, so essentially the room is for sleeping only.
Location:
Hokkaido, Haboro
Find a more detailed description of the ride to it here and a picture in front of it here.
This is a big a modern Shukubo (temple stay) right on top of a vulcano and obviously right beside the temple. Osorezan being apparently one of the 3 most sacred places in Japan. The room was really superb. Probably so far on this travel the best room I had. Food was below my expectations (which were high). And as due for a temple stay, you get to participate in the morning prayer at 6:30
Highlights:
Location! On a vulcano, right besides a temple, on one of the 3 most sacred places of Japan
This is a basic business hotel, quite small and I think family run in the small city of Noheji. It might not look very inviting from outside, but actually inside it is all totally new. The room is basic, but you get your own toilet and shower, which is not standard everywhere in Japan, specially with Japanese rooms.
This is a small simple ryokan with a superb onsen with two rotenburos (one mixed bathing, one female-only) in the middle of nature, but still reasonable reachable without any hiking skills.
Highlights:
onsen pools surrounded by nature with direct views into the river gorge (see here for a rating of the onsen)
If you are lucky you can watch the monkeys while bathing (you bathing, monkeys at their daily chores)
Location:
Toyama, Kuronagi onsen (on the Kurobe railway line)
Find a more detailed description of the experience here and here
This hotel is one in the chain of Kyukamura ("vacation village"). It is located right inside a national park and this is definitely one of its attractions.
Highlights:
nice landscape directly surrounding the hotel
reasonably good dining and breakfast buffet
several activities are offered by the hotel
Location:
Aichi, Cape Irago
See here & here for a description of the experience
The very last day of this trip by bicycle, train, bus, ferry, plane, taxi and on foot through Japan, did not see a single kilometer on the bicycle... but many in a plane
Bicycle: 0 km
Bus: 14 km
Taxi: 29 km
Plane: 1000 km
Route: Fukuoka hotel to city museum and airport and back to home in Tokyo
Weather: Rainy and quite cold
Although this travel through Japan was about bicycle travelling, at least mainly, today on my very last day, no bicycle riding involved at all, as it was raining outside quite intensely and cold:
After considering my options, I excluded to make a last minute splash to Toto toilet museum in Northern Kyushu, for being simply too far from Fukuoka. Looking at my other museum options closer to Fukuoka I found the Fukuoka city museum and took a bus there.
It was actually a quite good, modern museum. Somewhat similar to the Edo museum in Tokyo, with lively exhibits explaining the history of Kyushu since prehistoric times until today. There was also a good English audio guide and also many of the descriptions in the museum were in English. So I think it was a good option what to do on this rainy, cold day.
I made it back to the hotel in time, to catch a cab to the closeby airport and then off my brompton and we back to Tokyo.
On the last but one day of this trip through Japan, only little cycling, but a very Japanese highlight, Sumo at the Fukuoka tournament and also my last onsen soak of this ride.
Bicycle: 5.2 km
Riding time: 26 min
Total ascent: 28 m
Route: Hotel to Sumo tournament
Weather: Sunny, 12 C
After 56 days cycling through Japan I finally made it to one last highlight of this trip, the sumo tournament in Fukuoka. I had tried earlier this year to get tickets for the sumo tournament in Tokyo, but although I went to the internet page about 30 min after the pre-sale started, the page did not work, phone did not work either and by the time I was in a conbini (that actually was not to far from where I was at the time), there were no seats anymore on any weekends... and I didn't want to take a day off, "just" for watching sumo. So when the tickets for the Fukuoka tournament started pre-sale in early October, I immediately went ahead and got my ticket for today, a Tuesday.
On this day with perfect weather, I left my dear brompton outside parked below the sumo wrestlers flags and got in Fukuoka International center for a full day of Sumo fighting.
Sumo is organized in different grades but during a tournament day all grades fight. Starting in the morning with the most junior devision and then scaling up little by little to the more senior and up to the maximum division. When I arrived, not terribly early in the day, but still hours prior to the first professional league match, only a few people were already inside the hall, as one can appreciate from the pretty empty ranks.
Between the 6 different sumo divisions there is not really a noticeable change or a break, but little by little more spectators arrived and also the sumo wrestlers got more ceremony. E.g. the typical gesture of throwing salt into the ring, only started at the Juryo division (the second highest). Below that much less ceremony. Not only the sumo wrestlers themselves get more and more colourful (from uniformly greyish mawashi for all, to individually and colourful mawashis in the high divisions. Also the sumo judges get longer and more colourful robes as the day progresses.
Every now and then between the bouts the ring would get newly watered and swiped and after most fights there was at least some cleaning of the ring.
After a few low rank fights I made my way back to the atrium, to get a bento box and was right in time to see the arrival of a few of the highest ranking sumo fighters. A lot of people (maybe even more than inside) where waiting in the atrium, educatedly behind a yellow line on the floor, for their heroes. Who swept through quick paced with their helping junior sumo wrestlers behind them, carrying their belongings.
Sumo wrestler
Junior sumo wrestler with the bags
I had my bento on my seat and after some time the higher divisions started. There was even this colourful entry ceremony of the Juryo and Makuuchi division. Here of the Juryo:
In order that there is only minimal waiting time between the different fights, the next two wrestlers already sit along side the ring waiting for their match. In the highest division only, they get their personal cushion, brought in by one of their junior sumo wrestler-helpers.
Although the time to wait for the next sumo wrestler to enter the ring is small, the wait for the match to actually start gets longer from Juryo, as wrestlers do more and more ceremony. Here an entire match from first entering the ring to the actual match:
Here the fight also was actually quite long. Often it is only a few seconds (see the last few seconds of the video below):
Before the makuuchi division started, the reigning yokozuna performs his "entry dance" (for sure there is a technical, religious term for it):
Not after each fight, but from time to time even publicity comes through the ring, but as it is a sacred space, also the publicity is in ancient packing:
And here the final fight of the day, between Hakuho and Ichinojo, which ultimately was won by Hakuho, allowing him a few days later to win the third tournament this year by 14:1.
After an entire day of sumo, I concluded the day with my last onsen soak on this travel in an super-sento very close to the sumo hall.
Bicycle touring Japan - Ride maps
For details on the bicycle tour today in Fukuoka, checkout the below maps:
Today a relatively leisurely day with a short ride into central Fukuoka after a nice visit to a very nice zen garden and some Sumo in television in preparation for tomorrow.
Bicycle: 20 km
Riding time: 1:40 h
Total ascent: 38 m
Route: Dazaifu to Fukuoka
Weather: Sunny, but very windy again, 8 C The morning I spent very leisurely in the onsen of my hotel, alternating between the 3 rotenburos. While during the night it must have rained, by the time I was sufficiently washed the sun had come through. I didn't have a lot of touristic plan for today, as I was in Dazaifu early this year and had already seen all the major sights. But I remembered a very nice zen garden in a temple close to the main shrine, so I visited both. At the shrine there were again a lot of families with their 3, 5 or 7 year old kids. I think there were actually no 7 year olds, as today was a school day and most kids looked smaller.
To the shrine leads a pair of very typical bridges:
After a quick visit to the street leading up to the shrine, full of omiyage shops, I continued on to the zen temple.
One can sit on this "balcony" and gaze into the garden. Very relaxing.
This is how it looked back in May:
And here the same spot 6 months later:
I was also lucky that when I was there not many other tourists were visiting. But exactly when I left an enormous group (well, one bus load) of elderly Japanese entered.
With that I left Dazaifu behind me and road again very leisurely into Fukuoka. Part of my way was on the approach path to Fukuoka airport.
While I was riding on one of the typical Japanese bicycle lanes along a river.
This brought me to my final accommodation on this nearly 2 months trip through Japan, a Toyoko-Inn in central Fukuoka that I had reserved already 2 months ago, when I bought my sumo ticket. Tomorrow I will go to see the real thing, today I just watched it in TV, and saw Hakuho continuing his straight line of 8 wins in a row during this tournament as well as one match that needed to be repeated as the judges could not decide who was pushed outside of the ring first.
Bicycle touring Japan - Ride maps
For details on the bicycle tour today in Fukuoka, checkout the below maps:
Today an other cold day through the plain between Saga and a little uphill to Dazaifu, where I visited the interesting Kyushu National Museum before soaking in my onsen of the night.
Bicycle: 55 km
Riding time: 3:50 h
Total ascent: 294 m
Route: Saga to Dazaifu
Weather: Cloudy, a few drops of rain and later a bit of sun, strong wind, cold! 6 C It was cold and windy today! Really cold! Probably it didn't help that I had decided to ride just with a skirt (not stockings), but closed shoes and cardigan. Probably the jeans would have been more comfortable for riding. Apart the cold there isn't a lot to say about the ride today. Here two pictures of the landscape, which again was the typical Japanese mix of fields, houses in all states of repair and disrepair, less industry than yesterday, train lines, including the Kyushu shinkansen and streets crossing it. And me on one of them... Partially I found smaller roads, but specially when they were through open fields, the wind was even stronger and colder, so where possible I reverted back to ride through built-up area.
Shortly before Dazaifu I found a curry restaurant, I had driven by a lot of other restaurants, but somehow had decided that I absolutely wanted to warm up with some curry.
And then on to the one and only sightseeing spot of today, the Kyushu National Museum. An interesting building that I had seen earlier this year, when we were in Kyushu for Golden Week, but then I didn't have time to visit the inside. Originally I had hoped to visit it tomorrow... but tomorrow being Monday, it will be closed, and actually there was enough time today in the afternoon.
There was a very interesting exhibition about the Momoyama period. The time when the first Christian missionaries arrived to Japan and also other influences from overseas were present and Japan traded with other Asian countries. Before at the end of this era Japan was hermetically closed for all foreign contacts for the next 220 years. But during these few years when Christian missionaries first arrived to Japan and when Japan was finally closed off to the world, there was an active cultural exchange. In the exhibition was for example a folding screen with European city views, including Sevilla and Lisbon, or a wooden statue of Erasmus that had been conserved in a Buddhist temple. Also a embroidery with the virgin Mary that probably was produced in China was preserved in an other Buddhist temple. And through laboratories in Macao the Japanese folding screen became popular also in Europe. Apart from these intercultural objects, there were also a lot of tea ceremony objects that most of the visitors admired profusely. I have to admit that to me many of them look like first attempts at pottery in an evening class, but judge for yourself here. I also visited briefly the permanent exhibition of the museum that started with the Yayoi and finished around the Momoyama period. But only quickly as the museum was closing. So I rode over to my hotel on the hill opposite of the museum, here you can see the museum's roof from a distance as it integrates into the hill:
My hotel doubles as a day onsen. Before dinner I had a nice and relaxing bath, and I plan to have an other one tomorrow morning. Actually for tomorrow so far not a lot of plans, as I was in Dazaifu earlier this year and have seen already all major sights. But I guess I will to to the zen temple again and probably also the shrine. In Fukuoka itself there actually does not seem to be so many interesting things, so probably I will spend the morning soaking then off to Dazaifu "downtown" and then a short ride into Fukuoka. Tonight will be the last night in a Japanese room during my trip, as the next two nights are in a Toyoko-Inn in Fukuoka.
Not one of the nicest Japanese rooms, but nice. Generally I have preferred the Japanese rooms over the Western ones, as with the same m2 they seem spacier as the bed does not take up so much space and during day time the futon just gets folded up and packed away.
Bicycle touring Japan - Ride maps
For details on the bicycle tour today in Fukuoka and Saga, checkout the below maps:
