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.
383 km from Nikkō to Nikkō, about 7 h 21 of riding. The stops in between: Tajima Yahei Sericulture Farm, Takayama-sha Sericulture School, Tomioka Silk Mill and Related Sites and Arafune Cold Storage. 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.
Cedar trees line the road into Nikko as if it were a cathedral nave. The Nikko Kaido avenue, planted over many years in the seventeenth century, runs for about thirty-seven kilometres and is counted among the longest tree-lined avenues in the world, and the trees are huge now, thick and dark, with a floor of moss. It makes a quiet start, and it sets the tone for the town, which is as much a forest as a religious site.
Read the complete Shrines and Temples of Nikko write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Shrines and Temples of Nikko is where the day begins. Next is Tajima Yahei Sericulture Farm.
Silk transformed modern Japan, and Gunma Prefecture was its heartland. In the village of Shimamura, now part of Isesaki, on the north bank of the Tone River, stands the farmhouse of Tajima Yahei, a sericulturist who developed a method of raising silkworms in the nineteenth century. He built a two-storey house with a ventilation structure on the roof, allowing air to circulate through the upper floor where the silkworms were kept, and his design was widely copied across Japan.
Read the complete Tajima Yahei Sericulture Farm write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Tajima Yahei Sericulture Farm comes up about 105 km into the recorded legs. 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.
about 133 km into the recorded legs you reach Takayama-sha Sericulture School. 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.
Tomioka Silk Mill and Related Sites, about halfway. 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 sits at 163 km, about halfway. 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.
back through Tomioka Silk Mill and Related Sites comes up about 222 km into the recorded legs. Next is back through Takayama-sha Sericulture School.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Takayama-sha Sericulture School write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 243 km into the recorded legs you reach back through Takayama-sha Sericulture School. Next is back through Tajima Yahei Sericulture Farm.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Tajima Yahei Sericulture Farm write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Tajima Yahei Sericulture Farm, late in the day. Next is Shrines and Temples of Nikko.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Shrines and Temples of Nikko write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The route ends here after 383 km.
Shrines and Temples of Nikko → Tajima Yahei Sericulture Farm is 105 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Tajima Yahei Sericulture Farm → Takayama-sha Sericulture School is 28 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Takayama-sha Sericulture School → Tomioka Silk Mill and Related Sites is 23 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Tomioka Silk Mill and Related Sites → Arafune Cold Storage is 32 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Arafune Cold Storage → back through Tomioka Silk Mill and Related Sites is 34 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Tomioka Silk Mill and Related Sites → back through Takayama-sha Sericulture School is 21 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Takayama-sha Sericulture School → back through Tajima Yahei Sericulture Farm is 29 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Tajima Yahei Sericulture Farm → Shrines and Temples of Nikko is 110 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.