Our trip to Hakone!

As I wrote in the last entry, we went on a bike trip to Hakone and came back yesterday.



It was just an overnight trip, so we didn't need to bring a ton of stuff, but still we had a bit more luggage than usual. My new Ostrich pannier bags were put into good use.



Kao was quite excited about the trip as this was our first real vacation in a while. Now that Summer is over, the weather is much more comfortable and is just about perfect for a long rides on a bike.



It took us I think about two and a half hours to get to Odawara. We were quite hungry when we got there, so we ate lunch near the Odawara train station and looked around a bit. Odawara is quite a big city compared with Chigasaki or Oiso and it's a very Japanese city as there is the Odawara Castle, so it's somewhat tourist-y with lots of shops catering to visitors. After walking around the station area looking at mostly delicious looking foods and sweets, we rode over to the Odawara Castle. These iconic Japanese castles were all built within a period of half a century during the era just before the Edo period if I remember correctly. Not all of them still exist today and of ones that still do, many are ones that have been re-built after they were destroyed in earthquakes and fires. I believe the Odawara castle has been re-built. It stands wide and not as smart looking as some other castles, but when we went inside it was very roomy and it went up much higher than I expected.

Here's a view from the top of the the castle.


Another view with Hakone which is where we'll be heading.


From Odawara to Hakone Yumoto, it was surprisingly close. Here I am (I didn't even notice when Kao took this) looking at directions to get to our ryokan (inn).

It was exactly there that I made a wrong turn. If we had kept on going straight, it would have been just a gradual climb to our destination, but it looked like an easier route on the map to turn there. Unfortunately for us, that route turned out to be a series of pretty steep climbs followed by a very steep downhill to get to the ryokan, so we ended up doing more climbing than we needed.

But we made it and we were ready to rest and relax.


Our room at the ryokan. That's just by the window and there's a lot more to it. There was probably enough room to sleep 6-8 people.

The river just outside the window looked like this.


We took a bath (hot spring water) and then changed into Yukata (light kimono) and went for a stroll around the area.


It got dark pretty quickly and it was time to go back for dinner.


Lovely, isn't it?


Hungry?

Mmmmm! It was all so good after a day of bike riding (and sight seeing). There was even more than what's shown in these pictures, but we were too busy enjoying the food to take pictures of everything.

More dinner? No, this is breakfast actually.


We took full advantage of the rare opportunity to indulge not just in eating, but we also took another bath after dinner and then one more before breakfast. As you may know, the Japanese love taking baths, but onsen(hot springs) baths are special as the onsen water is rich in mineral with various health benefits. For example, a bath of regular water does warm the body and is good for blood circulation, but after this onsen bath we were very warm for many hours, much longer than usual. A stay at an onsen ryokan may not be super fancy, but for me, it's a perfect luxurious experience. You get to take as many hot springs baths as you like and then they bring you delicious food right to your room. After dinner, they even set the futon for you and you can just relax and fall asleep if you want. When you wake up, they clear the futon and bring you breakfast. What's not to like about that? Of course it costs a little more than a stay at a simple hotel, but when you consider all the extra things you get, it's not all that expensive. For us, it's not something we can afford too often, but it's really worth it on special occasions.

After checking out of the ryokan, we rode around the area for some more sight seeing.


There was this really old path of cobblestones which I think may have been a part of the foot path from Tokyo to Osaka.


Then we went and checked out a couple more places like the Tamadare waterfalls,


and the Zeniarai Benten shrine,

then headed back to Odawara.

We went to the fishing port in Odawara and went to the Fish market restaurant.

Lunchtime!


Yay!
It was indeed as delicious as it looked.


Yes, it was well worth the trip, thought Kao.


"smoking is bad for you!" said the Octopus.


After all that fun, it was time to ride again. And we rode somewhat more slowly for a good 3 hours. Took some shots of the Surly on the Chigasaki beach front almost near home for good measure. The bikes rode great. Thanks bikes. We had a lot of fun and are looking forward to the next adventure with you.

We're ready for our Fall bike trip

It's been quite a while since the last post. I guess there haven't been that much to write about. I've been riding my bike around daily, but haven't been on any epic rides to write about. The weather here has been quite strange. We had a super hot Summer here and then in a matter of a few days, the temperature had dropped like 10 degrees(celcius) and it felt like we skipped fall altogether and gone straight to Winter. That didn't last too long fortunately and now it's neither too hot or too cold, just about perfect weather for bike riding.

We are actually going on a "long ride" by our standards tomorrow. We are going to Hakone and spend a night at a hot springs inn and ride back the next day. Hakone is the first real mountain on the coast from Tokyo to Osaka. We're actually going to Hakone Yumoto which is at the foot of Hakone, so we won't really be climbing up the mountain. It is a long ride compared to what we'd been riding, but there are plenty of people who would ride from Tokyo to Hakone and back all in a single day. We're not one of those people. We're just gonna enjoy a long ride at a leisurely pace and then enjoy a hot bath and some good food. You all know what I'm talking about if you'd ever been to an Onsen in Japan.

The picture at the top is Kao with her bike. We got some slightly fatter tires for it. Kao says that the bike with these 700 x 28 Panasonic Pasella tires are so much more stable and easier to ride.



I put the tires backwards as some of you may have noticed, but that's been corrected. I also got the Ostrich pannier bags for my bike as we'll need to carry more stuff than usual for an overnight stay. These ones aren't those nice canvas bags, but the ones made of nylon that's a lot more reasonably priced. They seem a little more flimsy than my Minnehaha bag, but we'll see how they'll work out.. I didn't get any pictures of them, but I'm sure we'll take a lot of pictures on this trip.

I'll leave you with this picture of a miraculous encounter I had with a fairy on the Fujisawa-Yamato cycling road.

Summer riding

Well we've been on a number of rides since the last entry, but we haven't taken so many pictures on them to do a proper entry about any one ride. Instead, I will just post what pictures we have taken recently and comment on them.



Here is Kao at the Shichirigahama beach.
This was the destination of our ride one day when we did take pictures.


View Larger Map

We went from Fujisawa towards Kamakura and turned South where the Shonan monorail crosses. The map direction begins there. Then the road will go up to Kamakura-yama (Kamakura-hill) which is quite a steep hill to climb. It was the first time we were there so I was too preoccupied with finding the way to take pictures. After the climb, it was all downhill to the Shichirigahama area.



Here I'm riding through the nice path (with no cars) that leads to the ocean front.



You can see the ocean where the road starts to go downhill.



I've crossed the Enoden train tracks and is just a street away from the ocean front.

Kao was taking all the pictures until now, but then I took the picture of her which is at the top.

Shichirigahama isn't all that far from where we live and we just wanted a short casual ride, but the Kamakura-yama was more hilly than we expected.



Another day, we went to the Tsujido beach to take pictures of ourselves. Here's Kao on her bike.

It's been long overdue, but we'd been meaning to make a "We've moved" card for sometime and so we needed material for that.



If you look at this picture closely you might find it a bit strange. That's because it's actually made up of two separate shots. I photoshoped it to make it look like we are standing next to each other.



Here's me on my bike. Kao likes taking pictures of me, but I don't think I'm as photogenic as her.





And a couple of more shots by Kao of surfers riding bikes along the beach. This is a quite typical scenery along this beach. I would say that more than half of the people riding bikes in the area are usually carrying surfboards.

I spent my junior high and high school years in Southern California where surfing was very popular and I tried it as well, but I really was no good at it so I have no desire to try it again, but I think it's quite a romantic sport and I like being around it while riding along the beach.

Japan has had one of the hottest Summers in recent history, but it's finally beginning to cool down a bit. It's quite an adventure to ride the bike under the blazing sun, but it should become a bit easier now. We should be able to go on longer rides without having to worry about heat stroke or sunburn.

Mumbreeze goes to Oiso

Last Friday, we rode to Oiso. I've probably mentioned Oiso briefly here and I had ridden there a few times by myself, but this was the first time we rode there together. I wasn't sure if Kao would be able to ride all the way there or not, but we took it easy and it wasn't a problem. For the purpose of this entry, we'll start at the Tsujido station which is a major train station near our place. From the station we headed South towards the ocean and then took the Shonan Shindo (Shonan New Way) and went towards the ocean. The picture above is the bridge that crosses from the Shonan Shindo to the Hamasuka beach.


View Larger Map

From there, we rode along the beachfront for most of Chigasaki.



That's the "C" monument of Chigasaki Southern Beach.

From there we crossed the Sagami River into Hiratsuka and rode along cars on the Highway 134 all the way to Oiso.



This is the Oiso beach. It is supposedly Japan's first public beach. It's actually a tiny bit of Oiso waterfront, but the rest of the coast is hard to access because of the highway and the beach isn't sand.







This beach is definitely not as hip as around Enoshima as you can see these old style "Umi no Ie", but I really like the rural atmosphere of Oiso.

After the beach, we rode into town.



It's mostly quiet and residential.



We stopped at a Curry restaurant called Chairo (color brown) and had lunch. Curry and vegetable plate was very good. After that we rode the Taiheiyou Jitensha-do (Pacific Ocean Cycling Road) which runs along the coast, but right next to the Highway 1 which blocks most of the view of the beach and the ocean. I don't know why they didn't build it on the other side of the highway.



Oiso for the most part though is easy to ride though.



I snapped this picture while waiting at a signal. This may not look like much of a bike lane, but this is actually pretty good. Usually the white line is much closer to the sidewalk and so you have very little space to ride. A lot of the times, you end up riding in these gutter things which are much less smooth and has drains every 10 meters or so. Here. you have a bit more asphalt and the gutter is nice and smooth and it's fairly seamless in between. It may not be the perfect bike lane, but I felt a lot more comfortable there than on most streets with car traffic here. There is quite a bit of bike traffic, both sporting cyclists and locals riding around town, so cars seem to be used to them as well.



We rode back after that, riding along the beach when we got back to Chigasaki. Kao faired much better than I thought although she didn't drink enough water and was a bit dehydrated and had a headache after. I bug her to drink enough water, but I didn't check how much she was drinking. I'll have to get on her case even more next time.

Fujisawa Yamato Jitensha-do

Last week, we took the local cycling road called "Fujisawa Yamato Jitensha-do" (Jitensha-do means cycling road) from Fujisawa where we live to Yamato which is about 15Km to the North. The cycling road runs along the Sakai River. We have been riding along the Hikichi River quite often as it is quite near where we live and it too has a cycling road, but it's in bits and pieces with lots of gravel in between. I hadn't heard about the Fujisawa Yamato route until I found it on a Japanese cycling blog. It seemed like quite a nice and long route, so we decided to give it a try.



Some parts of it was overgrown with plants and that made the path narrower, but for the most part, it was quite nice to ride. I didn't take the best photos as I was just enjoying the ride, but I think it's the best cycling road I've been on in Japan as of yet. It's maybe almost as good as the Springwater trail in Portland. It was quite refreshing as most places I'd been riding are very nice, but still most streets lack any kind of real consideration for bicycles.



Yes, I'm loving my Surly.



We met our friend in Yamato and had a nice talk with her in a family restaurant (Japanese equivalent of Denny's) where you can order a "drink bar" and drink all the drinks (non alcholic) for like a dollar.

Then we made our way back to Fujisawa, but made a little detour to the Iida Dairy Farm.



It's the self-claimed smallest dairy farm in Japan and they sell ice cream and cheese cakes there. We had a nice gelato and met with the cows who live right in the back.





We got a little rained on, but by the time we were near Fujisawa, it cleared up. It was a very good ride.

I wish I had taken better pictures, but if you check out this page, you can see what it's like. The text is in Japanese, but if you are curious about other rides in the area, the site has reviewed quite a number of them, so you might want to check them if you're thinking of riding in this area.