CURVESCOUT / MOTORCYCLE RIDE
Ordered leg totals agree within rounding. Stop distances are approximate sums of rounded legs. Stops, delays, approach and any separate return travel add time. Basis: producer-declared routed record.
Reading history stays on this device. My road watch requires a separate selection; opening it does not subscribe this ride.
Distance and riding time are measured on the routed road. Check local closures and conditions before you ride.
A 288 km round trip from Nagano - roughly 5 h 42 in the saddle. On the way it passes Arafune Cold Storage, Tomioka Silk Mill and Related Sites, Tomioka Silk Mill and Takayama-sha Sericulture School. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 1,200 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available. A steady touring day rather than a sprint.
Nagano is a city organised around a temple. Zenko-ji, which is over thirteen centuries old by tradition, has drawn pilgrims for so long that the city grew up on its approach, and the main avenue, lined with shops selling sweets, incense and crafts, leads gently uphill to the great wooden hall. The temple belongs to no single Buddhist sect, and its principal image, a hidden Buddha said to have come from Korea in the sixth or seventh century, is never shown to the public. A copy is displayed every few years.
Read the complete Nagano write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Nagano is where the day begins. Next is Arafune Cold Storage.
High in the mountains of southwestern Gunma, near the border with Nagano, a series of stone-walled pits sit among the trees on a hillside. They look like ruins, and in a sense they are, but in their day they were cutting-edge technology. The Arafune cold storage, built in the early twentieth century, used the cold air flowing out of crevices in a rocky slope, a natural wind cave or fuketsu, to keep silkworm eggs cool and delay their hatching. This allowed silk farmers to raise several batches of silkworms a year instead of just one, greatly increasing production. At its peak, the facility stored eggs for farmers from across Japan and even abroad. It is part of the UNESCO listing of the Tomioka Silk Mill and Related Sites, inscribed in 2014, which tells the story of how Japan became the world's largest exporter of raw silk.
Read the complete Arafune Cold Storage write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Arafune Cold Storage comes up about 90 km into the recorded legs. Next is Tomioka Silk Mill and Related Sites.
In 1872, barely four years after the Meiji Restoration had ended the rule of the shoguns, Japan's new government opened a model silk-reeling mill in the small town of Tomioka in Gunma prefecture. It hired a French engineer, Paul Brunat, imported French machinery, and recruited young women from across the country to learn the new techniques and take them home. The long brick buildings, a curious mix of Japanese timber framing and European brick, still stand, and the mill operated until 1987. In 2014 it was inscribed on the UNESCO list together with related sericulture sites, such as farms where silkworm rearing methods were improved and a cold storage cave used to control the hatching of eggs.
Read the complete Tomioka Silk Mill and Related Sites write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
At least about 122 km into the recorded legs you reach Tomioka Silk Mill and Related Sites. Next is Tomioka Silk Mill.
Tomioka Silk Mill is a long, low brick building with a timber frame, and it looks stranger than it is. In 1872, only a few years after the Meiji government opened Japan to the West, the state built this factory to produce silk by modern methods and sold it abroad to pay for the country's modernisation. A French engineer, Paul Brunat, designed it and hired French instructors, and the brick, laid in a pattern known as Flemish bond, was made locally by workers who had never seen a brick building before. The cocoon warehouses, with their sturdy roof frames, are still among the biggest wooden-framed brick buildings in Japan.
Read the complete Tomioka Silk Mill write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Tomioka Silk Mill, about halfway. Next is Takayama-sha Sericulture School.
Silk built modern Japan, and the hills of Gunma prefecture were its engine room. In the second half of the nineteenth century, farmhouses across this region raised silkworms on the upper floors, and the quality of the cocoons decided the fortunes of families and, eventually, of the nation's exports. At the Takayama-sha site in Fujioka, a farmer named Takayama Chōgorō developed a method of raising silkworms that balanced ventilation and temperature, and he trained students from across Japan in his large farmhouse. You can still see the building, with its distinctive roof vents running along the ridge, designed to let warm, moist air escape.
Read the complete Takayama-sha Sericulture School write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Takayama-sha Sericulture School sits at 132 km, about halfway. Next is back through Tomioka Silk Mill.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Tomioka Silk Mill write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Tomioka Silk Mill comes up about 167 km into the recorded legs. Next is back through Tomioka Silk Mill and Related Sites.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Tomioka Silk Mill and Related Sites write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 168 km into the recorded legs you reach back through Tomioka Silk Mill and Related Sites. Next is back through Arafune Cold Storage.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Arafune Cold Storage write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Arafune Cold Storage, late in the day. Next is Nagano.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Nagano write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The route ends here after 288 km.
Nagano → Arafune Cold Storage is 90 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Arafune Cold Storage → Tomioka Silk Mill and Related Sites is 32 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Tomioka Silk Mill → Takayama-sha Sericulture School is 21 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Takayama-sha Sericulture School → back through Tomioka Silk Mill is 23 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Tomioka Silk Mill and Related Sites → back through Arafune Cold Storage is 32 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Arafune Cold Storage → Nagano is 90 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.