Day 1 – Saturday 10th of October, Tokyo to Nagano
This was originally supposed to be a diving weekend to Hachijojima, but due to some typhoons this got cancelled. My next idea was just to have a quiet one at home, cleaning up, and playing computer games. But the weather turned out to be fantastic, and my buddy Ben had decided to head up to Nagano to see if there were some early autumn leaves out.
Despite a bit of a heavy week I decided at the last second to join him, booked a hotel, and headed out to catch up with him on Saturday morning. The first half of the day I did my own thing, checking out a couple of sights along the way which I hadn’t stopped at before.
The first of these was the Usui Pass 3rd Bridge, or Megane Bashi, an abandoned red-brick railway bridge built in 1892. I had ridden past it before, but never stopped. These days it is not only a great photo opportunity, but you can actually go up onto it. Quite a large section of the old railway has been converted into a hiking trail which goes over the old bridges and through the old tunnels, past abandoned stations, and with fantastic views over the surrounding countryside.
Next was the Shiraito waterfall. This is along a toll road, which is probably why I always skipped this previously. Turns out it is well worth a stop as the waterfall seeps out from a layer of porous ground above a water-impervious layer, rather than simply being a river, so it is quite a unique sight despite only being a few meters high.
From there I headed up to the Onioshidashi Volcanic Park which I had visited previously with mum, but Ben had stopped there for lunch and a drone photo-shoot, so I could finally catch up to him. We had a bit of a wander through the park which has some amazing rock formations, glowing moss, and a nice temple built atop it all. The name of the lava flow, which occurred in 1783 means “expelling daemons”, and the tourist shop sells lots of Oni figurines.
We didn’t really have any other specific stops from here on, but had an amazing set of roads, especially up and over Mt Shirane. The road we took has been closed a lot due to volcanic gases, but today it was open and we got a good view of an active section of venting on top of the volcano. These roads also go over the highest navigable
Our evening stop was in Yudanaka, me in the Snow Monkey Lodge hostel, and Ben in a nearby hotel. The hostel is really welcoming and has great facilities, even a little onsen. But before we could meet up for dinner I got a call from Ben – he’d lost one of his saddlebags on the way down the mountains! So off we went in the dark to try to find it, retracing nearly 30km of windy mountain road and, incredibly, there it was on the side of the road! A passing vehicle must have stopped and propped it up. Amazingly there was barely any damage.
Back in Yudanaka we had a nice dinner at a local Izakaya, then onsen and bed – it was a long day!
Day 2 – Sunday 11th of October – Nagano to Suwa
Today we had a lot less on – mostly just making our way to the Venus Line, an amazing set of roads around Mt Kirigamine, and enjoying the scenery along the way.
We got started quite a lot later than we planned, met up at a local kombini for a coffee and a quick bite to eat, and then set off just as the fogs started to lift off the mountains. Overall the day was a bit frustrating as there was a LOT of traffic, especially over the Venus line, making progress a lot slower than expected.
One of the best spots we stopped off at was a tiny little lookout not far out of Nagano giving an impressive view over the mountain ranges in the area. While it was a waypoint on our route, it was mainly set to force the route over a particular road, with no particular expectations.
The other main spot we stopped off at Utsiushigahara Open Air Musem. While we didn’t care much for the actual museum part, which mainly consists of large art sculptures dotted around the landscape, the parking lot has a fantastic view over the surrounding landscape.
For lunch we stopped at a roadside area which Ben had been to before and recommended the soba which turned out to be pretty good.
Heading down from Mt Kirigamine we split up, Ben heading to his hotel, and me heading to meet up with Julie, and old friend and diving buddy of mine, who lives at Lake Suwa these days. Unfortunately it was a bit late by the time I got there to take her for a ride, so instead of meeting up with Ben again for the ride back to Tokyo, we made a plan for a ride-out instead.
Day 3 – Monday October 12, ride-out and back to Tokyo
As Julie had never been on a motorbike before, we first did a small loop of Lake Suwa, to see if she liked it at all, which she did! We then went up the Venus line to Lake Shirakaba, which is one of my favourite stops for an ice-cream, giving us fantastic views over the countryside along the way.
As Julie was happy to keep riding, I planned a loop along the 482 to Saku, and then back to Lake Suwa along the very picturesque 299, also knows as the Märchenstraße (road of fairy-tales). As well as being very beautiful, the road is also mostly a great motorbiking route.
The 482, despite being classed as a major national route, turned out to be an incredibly bumpy and poorly maintained single-track road winding its way through forests and, for part of it, farmland. I hadn’t done the first part of it before, but when we reached the farmland I recognised it, but by then we were most of the way to Saku, so there was no point looking for an alternative at that stage.
The 482 had taken far more time than I had anticipated, and we got to Saku a lot later than planned. We had a late lunch at an italian restaurant, where I had spaghetti puttanesca, which was very nice despite a distinct lack of anchovies..
I also got a big shock – Ben had sent a text saying he’d crashed his bike and hurt his shoulder. Despite that he was making his way back to Tokyo as there was only minor damage to the bike and he could manage.
Then it was back on the road and the 299 more than made up for the 482, with nice tarmac, few cars, and gorgeous scenery. I had wanted to stop off at the “Mononoke Forest” for a little hike, but unfortunately it was getting a bit late in the day.
I dropped Julie off at her house and in the meantime Ben had made it home and was heading to the hospital for a checkup. But he asked me if I could drop in on his house on the way home to help him park up the bike.
To avoid the rush-hour traffic home, I stopped off at a roman-style onsen, which is a much deeper bath than a normal onsen, and relaxed my tired muscles for an hour or so before the long dark ride back to Tokyo. Originally I had wanted to take some nice roads home, but as it was already dark I just jumped on the highway and, as planned, it was mostly clear riding all the way.
When I got to Ben’s place it turned out he’s got a multiple fracture of his collar bone. Ouch! And he still rode his bike home! I helped him park up his bike, told him to call if he needed anything else, and finally got home around midnight.
