I had quite the bicycle ride last week; this blog post is mostly a diary for my own memory.

What started out as a pleasant ride with friends ended up 12 hours later being a test of nighttime eyesight and creative headlight battery management.

The Relive.cc video of the ride gives a sense of this never-ending ride.

I planned a longish ride to the north of Kyoto, but would be joined at the beginning by Stephanie and Manseki. We'd intended to head over the mountains via the Hiei climb, but rush-hour traffic on the narrow road made us turn around and head north via Ohara.

From Ohara, Stephanie returned to Kyoto for an appointment, while Manseki and I continued north up the Tochu climb, then down toward Lake Biwa.

My main goal of the ride was to do a particular climb way up north, but also try a bunch of short-but-intense tangential climbs hanging off the route along the way. I'd found them by scouring satellite photos via Google Earth looking for what seemed to be paved roads up into the mountains; until I tried them, I didn't know whether access was even allowed, or whether they were paved, but this kind of exploration is all part of the fun.

I had done some of these climbs on “Disappointing and Truncated “Search for The Big Steep” Ride” earlier in the month, including the 1.4km @ 13% “Blueberry Fields” climb and the 1.6km @ 12% Kurihara climb.

The first tangential climb today was the Myodokai Climb, a nicely-paved 1.7km (1mi) at a mild 8%. It's on the grounds of a Buddhist organization's campus, so there's little traffic, and it offers nice views during the return descent.

I'd also done this one earlier in the month, and as is my habit the first time I ride a climb, I'd taken it slowly. This time wasn't the first time, so I put a bit of effort into it. I enjoy going slowly more than quickly, at least on the up-hill parts. 🙂

Because of the nice pavement and little traffic, the return descent could be great fun, but somehow I don't feel it's appropriate to ride like that at a religious site, so I take the descent slowly.

The next bit of tangential exploration turned out to be the centerpiece of the ride. On paper it looked brutal... 2.1km (1.3mi) at an average of 15.3%... but it turned out to be so very much worse.

As I often lament, I just can't capture the steepness in a photo. A change of slope is easy to capture, but when everything you can see is a straight 20% slope, it looks to the camera the same as a straight section of flatness. But what made this road just ridiculous is its combination of steepness and slipperiness.

I did a much steeper road just the other day in the Ushiokannon Final Death Climb, which hits a 32% grade along the way (here's a video of me slowly grinding up that climb last January), but as steep and low-quality as that road is, it's not actively trying to kill you with each pedal stroke.

Today's road was wet and slimy and the rear wheel would often lose traction on the downstroke, and you'd have to unclip (quickly!) to avoid falling over. Eventually I wasn't able to get enough traction to restart myself, so I was stuck. I didn't want to push the bike up, but I also didn't want to give up. It wasn't fun at all, but as a matter of pride I wanted to say I “rode” it, so I would sort of hobble along, keeping my left foot on the ground while scooching myself forward by pushing down on the right pedal. Sometimes I lost traction doing even that, so it was exhausting and all-in-all a stupid endeavor.

When I reached bright area seen in the photo above, there were some dryer sections of road, so I tried to ride again, and after a few efforts was successful, and completed the short bit of road that remained.

Now we had to get back down.

This last picture is probably the only one that gives a sense of slope, with Manseki being there for reference. I used an unorthodox and visually-hilarious method to descend safely: while keeping the right leg clipped in, I lay my stomach on the seat to keep the weight on/behind the back wheel, both giving the back wheel more traction, and keeping the center of gravity far enough back to avoid flipping myself over the front of the bike.

You can see it a bit in this short video clip that Manseki made:

The left foot is free, there to catch if you indeed lose traction. It looks ridiculous, but less so than crashing.

(Upon returning home, I was surprised to find that Manseki and I were the only ones to have logged this segment. I didn't expect it to be popular, but it's hard to believe no Strava user had ever done it. I guess riders in Japan just aren't adventurous.)

After we returned to civilization, Manseki had to return home, so I continued north alone.

Suddenly my motivation was gone. I love exploring on my own (like this), but I had been in “cycling with a buddy” mode, and with the stupid ascent/descent we had just done, and then being on my own, I just felt deflated.

Nearby was another tough-looking climb on my list that could well turn out to be a fiasco similar to the one I'd just finished, but I dutifully soldiered on.

Then to cap off a lovely mood, my left shoe suddenly would no longer clip into the pedal...

I'd been using these clips since just after this ride last November, which means I got 5,761 km (3,580 miles) out of them. I had been thinking that I should get new ones soon, but the struggles up and down the previous climb put the left cleat over the edge.

Not being able to clip in left me feeling vulnerable... what a difference from a year ago when I had trepidation about clipping in. Now with the likelihood of slipping out if I put too much power, I just didn't have much will to try anything challenging.

Early on the next tangential climb, which was steep but still mostly better paved, I came across a metal “feature” in the road that stretched all the way across. As I approached I knew it would be super slippery so made an effort to lunge across it without using power while the wheel was on the metal, but I failed and slipped and almost fell over. I didn't fall, and decided to cut my losses on this climb.

I returned back down, leaving the exploration of the rest of the climb for some future dry, better-cleat, better-mood day.

I moved on to the next tangential climb, which I knew would be easier and very well paved, the entrance road to Biwako Valley, a ski/nature area. With an average of only 10.3% over 2.6km (1.6mi) of wide, beautifully-paved road, it felt like a siesta compared to the previous two hours.

Biwako Valley has a cable car that brings people to the top of a mountain (“Japan's fastest”), and apparently the one in operation now is not the original, because the paved climb goes past the remnants of a cable car.

Still feeling tired and unmotivated, I stopped for lunch.

It was delicious, and I used the time to recharge my batteries both figuratively and, in the case of some of my bike's equipment, literally.

After lunch, I had about a half-hour's flat ride north before I got to my next climb, and along the way was surprised to see signs for a “Shimano Villa”. I had to follow them.

“Shimano” is a common name in Japan, but in this font and this color, it could only mean the company that makes the groupset on my bicycle (the pedals, gears, chain, etc.). Land is cheap in this area, so lots of companies have “retreats” of some sort here, so I supposed this is what it would be, but with my sudden need for a new cleat, I thought I'd check it out.

Sadly, but as expected, it's for the private use of the company and there was no retail, nor anyone around who might happen to have a spare set of cleats.

Now feeling better, I was about to embark on a 400m climb that was new to me (though I'd descended it once last year here). But first I had to pass the animal-control gate, which keeps wildlife out of the farmers' crops...

There are little water flows all over the mountains, sometimes accessible right at the side of the road. Sometimes they're specifically made into “springs” for people to collect the water, like this and this, and sometimes easy access is natural, like this.

The case above, however, is a bit in between. Water is pouring out of a small hole in the concrete gutter below the level of the road surface, and to give access to the stream someone fashioned a spout of sorts by shoving in an old can with the top and bottom apparently removed. Time has not been kind to the rusting steel can, and the whole area certainly looks like the gutter that it is. But the water is probably just fine, especially if you're thirsty enough.

Luckily, I had plenty with me, so I was fine. 🙂

Recent typhoon-related rains had brought out deep areas of sand and debris in some places....

A the time I studied the boulder and couldn't for the life of me figure out how it just seemed to be floating there, but now I realize that it must have a cable anchored into it. Originally the rock supported the cable, but the rock fell, and now the cable supports the rock. This is pretty obvious from the photo, but at the time I just couldn't see it. Odd.

I descended into a little village, and wished that I had time to stop for coffee at this cafe, but it was past 3pm and I still had 80km and a lot of climbing before I'd get home, so I pressed on to the start of the next climb, the eastern climb to Nubudani Pass, which was the whole point of the ride in the first place.

The segment is 6.1km (3.8mi) at an average grade of only 5.3%, but the overall average doesn't really tell the story. The first half seems to be a gentle rise that eventually starts to ramp up, and much of the last half is in the 8~11% range. It wasn't challenging at my easy pace, but it was more work than “5.3% average” says.

The plaque with the name of the tunnel is missing from above the entrance, but this reference tells me the name is “Sawa Tunnel”. I'd love to know when it was built. The same reference says the road was first paved in the 50s, so perhaps then?

Upon exiting the tunnel you find a closed-for-the-season ski area, and a lovely descent on a road that's a cut above the eastern side I'd just climbed, though in the late afternoon I ran into (figuratively only, thank goodness) a number of snakes trying to warm themselves in the middle of the road with the last rays of direct sunlight.

This is normally the kind of descent that I love to do quickly, but I took it slowly because I worried about my eyes. I never want to ride quickly without eye protection (I can't tell you how many times I've had bugs both big and small ricochet off my sunglasses), but with the setting sun I worried that if I wore my sunglasses my view of the road surface would be too dark for safety.

I have clear safety glasses for just this kind of situation, but I hadn't brought them this time. So, I took it easy.

At this point it was 4:30pm, about an hour and a half to sunset. I knew that there was no way I'd make it home before dark, so faced some decisions about how to get home.

On one hand, the most direct path would be to take National Route 162 all the way into Kyoto, but the combination of traffic, tunnels, and dusk was not appealing from a safety point of view. On the other hand, halfway home I could leave the national route while it was still light, then take back mountain roads the rest of the way. This would add a bit of distance and a lot of climbing, in exchange for almost no traffic.

It would be really dark in the mountains, I knew, but I'd somehow make do. I had various lights.

It was still light when I left the national route, and so I'd take mountain roads to get home, first climbing up and over Nomi Pass, then up and over Hanase Pass, to descend into brightly-lit Kyoto.

Having something to concentrate on besides cycling really seems to help me go faster. Most of my mental effort was going into calculating how much battery I had left for which kind of light, and how best to use them, while at the same time trying to will my eyes into seeing more road detail. During all this I didn't even realize that I was moving quickly, and I ended up making a PR on the climb up to Nomi Pass by a wide margin.

“Fast” going up is quite a different thing than “fast” going down, and in the encroaching darkness I suddenly felt unsafe going down. The transition from “dusk” to “dark” happens remarkably quickly under the tree canopy in a mountain valley on a cloudy evening.

So, let's take inventory of the many lights I had available:

• My “Blinder” LED tail light. Battery probably okay. Helps me to be seen, but not to see.
• The tail light in my Fly-6 back camera. Battery unknown. Helps me to be seen, but not to see.
• My “Blinder” LED front light. Battery probably okay. Helps me to be seen, but not to see.
• Front light in my Fly-12 front camera. Battery unknown. Helps me to actually see.
• Flashlight on my iPhone. Battery probably okay for a while. Would help me to see, though awkwardly.

And here are some constraints:

• By law, I need a light of some kind on the front, especially once I descend into the city.
• By common sense, I need some kind of light on the back at all times.
• I need a light to see at all times, but most importantly when descending.
• Batteries running low.

This was the first time in my cycling carrier that I needed a light to see, save for the rare deserted tunnel I'd come across.

So, it was the first time that I used the light on my Fly 12 front camera. I had disabled the light completely in the settings, so re-enabled it and found that I could see pretty well with it, so long as I didn't go too fast. But some areas had the occasional streetlight, and in these areas I could be zippy.

Just as I arrived to the base of the northern climb to Hanase Pass, the battery of the Fly-12 died. I guess I should feel lucky that it lasted as long as it did. I'd been keeping it recharged via a spare USB battery I'd brought along (and had already used to recharge my tail light), but the spare battery was now dead, too.

So, I made the 30-minute climb to Hanase Pass in almost total darkness, using just the lowest-power half-a-flash-a-second mode of my front light to help illuminate the white lines on the side of the road. I knew that the road surface was pretty good, and there were occasional street lights, so it wasn't too sketchy, but it was definitely a new experience.

The road back down into Kyoto, though, is horrible, filled with potholes and rocks and general danger, so I was worried that without light I'd have to walk it. It turns out that the Fly-12 battery had recovered enough that I could use its light on low power, and it was enough to get me back to civilization where I then needed lights only to be seen.

Returning to Kyoto 12½ hours after leaving, I had one more stop before home:

It was wonderful and a well-deserved treat after a long day.

In the end I did 102 miles (view at Strava), making it my seventh's “century” ride.