Back in The Beautiful Mountains

 May 31, 2023

The Shinkansen train rolls slowly and silently into the station, looking mean with its long beak and green hue, bit like a crocodile, and takes me to Utsunomiya pretty fast, although not with its 200 mph top speed. Haven't quite got the hang of it yet, but when buying a ticket for this train at the station without having made a reservation, they charge you extra - in fact more than the ticket - for a non-reserved seat. Go figure...

On the bike, out of town, and I'm back in my favorite environment, where I will stay all day. First stop is Lake Chuzenji on a smooth two lane hairpin road that might be Honshu's answer to Italy's Stelvio Pass, just slower and greener. Most of the guardrails are either dented or recently replaced, so it's clear that I am not the only one enjoying going here. My smile gets wider and wider with each turn, the temperature drops with the higher altitude, and I even get to ride the Rt 120 three times, because the gas tank in the town up there is closed until tomorrow, and I'm not sure if I can make it far enough in the right direction. 

Not being fond of tour reports with route numbers, I'll make an exception this time. Rt 120 eventually leads me past several other mountain lakes and onto Rt 267 and Rt 62, or, in all three cases, the older and much smaller & curvier roads that run on the other side of the rivers. The sun is out intermittently, parts of Rt 62 sees me not stop and admire the scenery, but rather take the curves as fast as possible without the sidecar wheel leaving the ground. There's very little traffic and my kidneys remain in place the whole way down to Isesaki, where I want to visit a shop catering to 'dekotora' truck owners.

I make it an hour before they close at seven, get some bits for the Nimbus chopper back home, and eventually make an agreement to come back tomorrow and take pics of the shop's own decotora truck. They really are too crazy, as you will know if you checked the wikipedia link added yesterday. The whole phenomenon was started by the 1970s tv-series 'Truck Yaro' (soranews24.com/2022/0), and like the bosozuko bikes and cars it lives on, even if it topped years ago.

In the spirit of the Truck Yaro theme I go to the nearest ramen restaurant, and accidentally order two full meals. Using the price as a guide for how much food they'll serve didn't work this time.

Shinkansen trains french-kissing each other.


Ordinary, large and kingsize rates on expressway out of Utsunomiya.

Quite a few bikes were on the road to the lake. The guy in the red
jacket was on a 250 cc motard with large tires, which I'd consider
the ultimate tool for Japanese mountain roads.


Two of the many monkeys I saw. Usually too shy to stick around long 
enough for me taking a pic, the one on the right waited a bit, and 
then decided I was too evolved to have any kind of 
meaningful interaction with.

Lunch at the river bridge.


The factories no longer use the large badges up front, but one can usually
 count on the aftermarket to take care of that. 

Today's very nice & cheap hotel consists of 38 containers neatly lined up next to each other.









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