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 99 km round trip from Nagasaki - roughly 2 h 09 in the saddle. The stops in between: Takashima Coal Mine/ Takashima Coal Mine, Shitsu Village in Sotome and Nagasaki Shipyard/ Mitsubishi Senshokaku G. The line favours views over speed.
Senshokaku is a surprise in a shipyard city: a wooden Western-style guesthouse of 1904, built by Mitsubishi on the hillside above its Nagasaki shipyard so that foreign clients and dignitaries could stay in comfort while ships were built and launched below. The house, with its verandas and clapboard walls, looks out over the harbour, and from here the owners could watch their vessels take shape. Today it is part of the Sites of Japan's Meiji Industrial Revolution, which UNESCO recognised in 2015, and it is a reminder that heavy industry in Japan was as much about hosting and diplomacy as steel plate.
Read the complete Nagasaki Shipyard/ Mitsubishi Senshokaku G write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Nagasaki Shipyard/ Mitsubishi Senshokaku G is where the day begins. Next is Takashima Coal Mine/ Takashima Coal Mine.
Out in the sea off Nagasaki, a low island called Takashima was the place where modern Japan dug its first Western-style coal shaft. In 1868, in the very year of the Meiji Restoration, the Scottish merchant Thomas Glover went into partnership with the Saga domain to sink a shaft here using steam-powered machinery from Britain. The mine later passed to Mitsubishi and became one of the pillars of the company's rise, fuelling steamships, factories and the rapid industrialisation of the country. Takashima is now part of the Sites of Japan's Meiji Industrial Revolution, listed by UNESCO in 2015.
Read the complete Takashima Coal Mine/ Takashima Coal Mine write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Takashima Coal Mine/ Takashima Coal Mine comes up about 22 km into the recorded legs. Next is Shitsu Village in Sotome.
Sotome is a stretch of rugged coast north of Nagasaki, where steep hills drop into the East China Sea, and the village of Shitsu clings to its slopes. During the centuries when Christianity was banned in Japan, the farmers and fishermen of this remote area kept their faith in secret, passing down prayers and rituals from generation to generation, hiding their devotion behind Buddhist and Shinto practices. When the ban was lifted in 1873, many of them returned to the Catholic Church. The Shitsu church, built in 1882 under the direction of the French missionary Marc Marie de Rotz, stands on a hill above the sea, a simple white building with a low profile designed to resist the strong winds. De Rotz was more than a priest: he taught the villagers to make bread, pasta and textiles, built a clinic and a workshop, and his legacy is still honoured locally. The village and church are part of the UNESCO listing of the Hidden Christian Sites in the Nagasaki Region.
Read the complete Shitsu Village in Sotome write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 69 km into the recorded legs you reach Shitsu Village in Sotome. Next is back through Takashima Coal Mine/ Takashima Coal Mine.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Nagasaki Shipyard/ Mitsubishi Senshokaku G write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Takashima Coal Mine/ Takashima Coal Mine, late in the day. Next is Nagasaki Shipyard/ Mitsubishi Senshokaku G.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Nagasaki Shipyard/ Mitsubishi Senshokaku G write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Back at Nagasaki Shipyard/ Mitsubishi Senshokaku G. That is the ride.
Nagasaki Shipyard/ Mitsubishi Senshokaku G → Takashima Coal Mine/ Takashima Coal Mine is 22 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Takashima Coal Mine/ Takashima Coal Mine → Shitsu Village in Sotome is 47 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Shitsu Village in Sotome → Back to Nagasaki Shipyard/ Mitsubishi Senshokaku G is 31 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.