I just got back from yet another ride to Onyu Pass, the fourth in half as many weeks. (The first three were blogged about here, here, and here.)

This time, like the first, I went with a group of friends. Also like the first, I brought along the real camera (Nikon D4), but this time I also brought some real lenses. I haven't looked at all the photos yet, wanted to post a few.

To be continued...

So, I made a third cycle ride in a row up to Onyu Pass the other day. The first trip on a Monday was a lazy social ride of 149km (93mi). Later that week I did a faster solo ride that topped out at 165km (103mi).

This third trip the Monday following the first ended up being 206km (128mi).

I had three goals for the ride. The first was to improve my time on the 58km (36mi) mountainous stretch from the Ichihara area of Kyoto to the top of Onyu Pass. This involves a mile of elevation gain (more precisely, [...]

After the really pleasant social ride to Onyu Pass most of the way toward the ocean, far north of Kyoto the other day, I thought to more or less do the same ride again by myself, to do some things that would be inappropriate on a social ride: ride fast, and pause to explore tangential areas.

I started off zipping up and over Hanaore Pass the 40+km (~26 miles) to the village of Kutsuki in about an hour forty five minutes (as opposed to two and a half hours on the social ride), then immediately lost any gains in the [...]

We wanted to be able to watch YouTube on the living-room TV, so I bought an Amazon Fire TV. Living in Kyoto, I bought the Japan-market version that they warn can be used only within Japan. Fair enough.

However, in the process of trying to get it set up, I discovered some important restrictions that they fail to disclose:

An Amazon account is required for most things to work. Not a problem for us, obviously, but would be if we were gifting it to someone.

Then, to install the YouTube app on the device, so you can watch YouTube videos [...]

We had a nice social group ride to Onyu Pass, 75km (47 mi) of mountain roads north of Kyoto. The entire trip was about 150km (93 mi).

The first three hours would be just moving north, and would cover most of the length of National Route 367, thereby mostly mimicking the start of my recent "Stupid Cycling Tricks" ride.

I've cycled these hairpins eight times so far, but had never stopped for the view. Today was a relaxing ride, so I indulged. The big tower in the center is the subject of "Kyoto’s “I Fall” Tower" almost eight years ago.