{"id":730,"date":"2010-10-29T02:24:40","date_gmt":"2010-10-29T10:24:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.mountainbikebill.com\/blog\/?p=730"},"modified":"2010-10-29T02:30:43","modified_gmt":"2010-10-29T10:30:43","slug":"a-little-land-of-the-rising-sun-action","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.mountainbikebill.com\/blog\/?p=730","title":{"rendered":"A Little Land of the Rising Sun Action"},"content":{"rendered":"

After spending a few days in Seattle finishing up some work, I headed out to Japan to spend a week scoping out a\u00a0project for next year.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0As always I was hoping to squeak in a ride if time permitted.\u00a0\u00a0 I rented a mountain bike for the duration of my visit to serve as my primary means of daily transportation and potentially some recreation as well.\u00a0\u00a0 The weather was\u00a0 forecast to be pretty much icky for the week with Wednesday being partly sunny.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Wednesday came around and partly sunny was indeed the case with a full serving\u00a0 of windy and brisk to boot.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I was able to open my afternoon\u00a0enough to get in some “Off-Site Strategic\u00a0Planning”\u00a0 accomplished\u00a0on the bike.\u00a0\u00a0 While I still have some places to explore in this area on my list from previous visits<\/a>, I would not have time for that\u00a0with the shorter days October.\u00a0\u00a0 I had a handful of miles to ride on the streets to get to Zushi City where I would pick up the first part of the afternoon’s dirt adventure.\u00a0\u00a0 I had nearly forgotten just how culturally interesting in can be riding on the streets over here.\u00a0\u00a0 Narrow sidewalks, mom and pop businesses, scooters whizzing by, Japanese School Girl Uniforms<\/span>, lots of people out walking and peddling, etc…\u00a0 It is just an intersting scene.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

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On one section of road with a\u00a0bit of a climb in it\u00a0I came across a new sign that was not there\u00a0in June of last year. \u00a0I can’t read this sign but I know what it means.\u00a0 And I like it.\u00a0 The Japanese have a knack for iconing things so that just about anybody can figure things out.\u00a0 Rider Up!<\/p>\n

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Once I made it over the Sengen Trails which is commonly referred to by us Engrish folk as Duck Pond since the trail starts at a small pond that typically has ducks in it.\u00a0What a bunch creative Gaijins<\/a> we are\u00a0. \u00a0The\u00a0trail starts with\u00a0a heiniouly steep hike-a-bike up to a ridge that typcially requires you to shoulder the bike.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0With the rain the day before I\u00a0knew this was going to be a fun section with plenty of\u00a0slick clay.\u00a0\u00a0 It was about this time I thought about the fact I had never\u00a0taken the trail around this\u00a0little pond.\u00a0\u00a0So I decided to delay my hike-a-bike fun and go around the pond.\u00a0\u00a0I was fairly stoked to find that at the\u00a0end the pond was a little boardwalk\u00a0that was quite fun on the bike.\u00a0 It was just tight enough to be interesting and combined\u00a0with the really brisk air and the\u00a0thought\u00a0of falling into the shallow mucky end of this pond made this section downright fun.\u00a0 I had to do it a couple of times in both directions.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0This was a pretty cool 5 minute detour and added some newness the ride right out of the gate.\u00a0\u00a0 The Hike-A-Bike up to the ridge was every bit of clay treachery I expected, but I was soon rolling along the ridgetops.\u00a0<\/p>\n

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After climbing along the trails I made it up to\u00a0the top of Sengen Hill (or Peak – can’t remember ) there was some nice views of the mountains in the Hakone National\u00a0Park\u00a0in the distance, but\u00a0it tooks some effort to see as\u00a0mother nature is reclaiming the clearing in a hurry.\u00a0 As is often the case, Mt Fuji was hiding behind distant clouds.\u00a0 From here it was time to head down and I took one of my favorite routes down through the Tennin trail system before popping out on another street.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

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After a short bit of road interconnecting I got onto a series of trails that headed westward\u00a0towards Kamakura.\u00a0\u00a0 There are some really good trails\u00a0that are quite popular with hikers.\u00a0 Many of the trails are hundreds of years old with some of the more direct routes between the temples being over a\u00a0thousand years old.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

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There are several sections along the\u00a0route\u00a0where\u00a0the trail cuts through the top of the ridge via a slot or notch.\u00a0\u00a0Sometimes the notches are\u00a020-30 feet deep.\u00a0 I orginally thought that this was a result of\u00a0the trail being “cut” by some machinery or tools\u00a0sometime in the past.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The\u00a0slots in the ridge were actually created from the countless footsteps of people who have walked these trails\u00a0for hundreds of years.\u00a0\u00a0 Feet, time and\u00a0errosion have cut through the ridge tops.\u00a0 After riding and climbing along these ridges the exit was like\u00a0most of the trails in\u00a0the mountains around here, Hike-A-Bike up and White Knucklers on the way down.\u00a0\u00a0 The wet conditions earlier in the week made the descent quite challenging to ride and not much easier to walk.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 There was a least a couple of clay samples taken.<\/p>\n

Once I dropped off the ridgelines down into Kamakura I worked my way along the streets back to Yokosuka and my hotel.\u00a0 Later on that evening I met some old friends for dinner to catch up on thngs and to fawn over their\u00a0new baby girl.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0It was good times on pretty much all facets of the day.<\/p>\n

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