Sakai is the city of the bicycle, which should please a motorcyclist. The Shimano company, whose gears are on bikes all over the world, began here in 1921, and the city still has a long tradition of cycling, with a museum devoted to the machine near the Daisen Park. It seems apt that the same city should hold the biggest cluster of tombs in Japan. Dogameyama is one of the smaller mounds in the Mozu group, and like most of the small ones it is known more by its position than by any biography.
What I can say is that the Mozu tombs date from the fifth century and are part of a huge cemetery of rulers and their kin. Most are surrounded by water-filled moats, and the smaller companion mounds sit like satellites around the great ones. Some are only a few dozen metres across, with a trimmed grass cover and pine trees, and tucked between houses and railway lines. There is something moving about the way modern Sakai has grown around these ancient places without eliminating them.
The landscape is the plain of Osaka Bay, flat and densely built, with the Yamato river to the north and the city's old harbour to the west. Roads here are busy and run in grids, with bicycles, delivery trucks, and the occasional bus all competing for the lane. Early on a weekend morning, the streets are far calmer, and the moats are alive with ducks. Spring has cherry blossom, while June is the rainy season, and August is oppressively hot and humid.
Fuel is no problem in this big city, and Sakai has stations all over. The city also has a great food tradition, with delicate tea sweets, and Sakai knives, which are prized by chefs across the world. There are plenty of places for a rest near the park, and the old merchant quarter by the harbour has a few historic buildings worth a stroll.
From here, the ride list continues to Hokki-ji, an old temple near Nara famed for its three-storey pagoda, one of the oldest in Japan. The road passes the Kongo foothills and leads through a quiet country of small villages and rice fields.