I had quite the photogenic day on Monday, with a local outing in the morning to see a nearby temple's fall foliage, then a ride into the mountains to see by bicycle some of the places seen during the weekend's "First Taste of Kyoto’s Fall-Foliage Season, 2017 Edition" post.

Today's post is about the bicycle ride (view at Strava).

The photo that opens this post is the entrance path to the Koetsu-ji Temple (光悦寺), which I pass on the edge of town just before entering the mountains and making the climb toward Kyomi Pass. We first saw it on my [...]

In Japanese, bicycling a full loop around Lake Biwa, Japan's largest lake, is called 「ビワ1」("Biwa 1"), and depending on the route you take, is about 180~200km (112~124mi). It's a concept and phrase well known among cyclists, and even promoted by the Shiga Prefectural government, and that of various cities around the lake.

It's a lovely ride to do on a long summer day, with lots to see and enjoy, as I present in the story about the first time I did it 2½ years ago, in "Bicycle Ride Around Japan’s Largest Lake" (and its Part 2).

Part of what [...]

We had an eclectic little ride the other day to celebrate Joshua's birthday. Unlike a common ride that makes a big loop through some gorgeous mountains, this ride stayed closer to home, hopping from interesting point to interesting point, at a slow, fun pace.

It was my 16th time to ride with Joshua, since joining him on a NORU bike tour two and a half years ago.

It turns out that one can use this dirt trail to get around having to descent the "Nasty" 21% slope. Personally, I'd rather just descend on the road because neither my bike nor [...]

Alexis, a cycling Frenchman living in England, contacted NORU for a private bike tour around the far-flung mountains of Kyoto. Joshua set him up with a bike and took him around, while I tagged along for photos.

Right after this photo is the first real test of cycling ability, a short, steep climb that averages 10% over 760m (half a mile), but has some 17% sections.

When you're contacted out of the blue by someone for a bike ride, you're not really sure of their level and what would be appropriate/fun/challenging/daunting for them, so this initial climb would be a [...]

I had an enjoyable bike ride of exploration around the nooks and crannies of Ohara the other day, so I thought I'd share some photos. Here's the ride at Strava:

The impetus for this ride was to check out some of the minor roads I'd seen on 路面と勾 配 (literally "road surface and slope"), a blog full of reports on exceedingly-minor mountain roads, each replete with detailed photos and commentary. He's got well over 1,000 such reports so far.

I spend a fair amount of my time updating OpenStreetMaps based on his articles. These are the maps used by Strava, [...]