The fifth stage was the shortest of our tours. We wanted to stay one day at the Daisetsuzan National Park and thought Sounkyo was the best opportunity. We planned some hiking and wanted to enjoy the wild environment. So we had just to go a bit more than 20 km and do a few height meters. In the evening the…
At the beginnig of the 4th stage starting from Kamifurano we had to face two problems. First was the bad weather which we could deal with. Second was Alinas sickness. But the tour must go one and our destination was 80 km far away in Kamikawa. So we took it slowly. Luckily we did not have to climb much on…
The goal of the 3rd stage was Kamifurano but we had a rough start. Alex had still problems with his stomach, so we had to do a lot of breaks in the beginning. But then we passed a 7eleven and took the chance for a late breakfast. Afterwards we had a bit of climbing and cold conditions, so we were…
We started the second day at Inasato with a small japanese breakfast (朝ごはん) which included some juice and chocolate bread. We planned just a short trip to complete yesterday's tour. Our first stop was at small shrine next to a reservoir. Thanks to the sunny weather we could relax there and enjoy the view. The plan in the morning was…
First day on Hokkaido's roads We equipped our rental bicycles (Spark Cycling) at our hotel (Hotel Keihan Sapporo) and after that the "Tour de Hokkaido" could start early in the morning from Sapporo. The goal of our first day was around 100 km far. But first we had to cycle accross the entire city of Sapporo. Fully equipped bicycles at…
To test our fitness level for our upcoming tour in Japan we decided to make a bikepacking trip to Dahn in the Pfalz. So we prepared our bicycles and Alex added some extra back rack for bags. The start of the tour was pretty smooth. We crossed the Bergstaße till Mannheim very fast because almost everything was flat and there…
From Takamatsu we took a ferry to Kōbe. Also on this cruise we could greet one of these weird Japanese mascots. We let you interpret it in the gallery below. However, when we arrived at the port of Kōbe our plan was to cycle to a campsite just a few kilometers outside the city. We used the gpx track which…
During the night the Iya Valley showed us its frostily side. This was by far the coldest night of this vacation and even the extra blankets from the staff at the campsite could not warm us up. But the good thing is even these nights end sometime and the sun will show up again. So after we warmed up a…
We had a rainy rest day in Kōchi, so we decided to do some indoor activities. We went to the Kochi Prefectural Makino Botanical Garden. Of course not everything was indoor but there were a lot of opportunities to escape the rain. Also there was plenty of stuff to see and everything was really neat. We learned a lot about…
On our rest day before stage four we explored the Shimanto area. The first stop was the "Nature Center". The staff was really surprised when we entered the building. Maybe at this time of the year you don't see many people around here - especially not from Europe. But they were very friendly and offered us tea and cookies. The…