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 562 km round trip from Kagoshima - roughly 9 h 56 in the saddle. The stops in between: Sakitsu Village in Amakusa, Takashima Coal Mine/ Takashima Coal Mine and back through Sakitsu Village in Amakusa. A steady touring day rather than a sprint.
Charcoal does not sound like a monument, but at Terayama it was part of a project to modernise a whole domain. The Shimazu lords of Satsuma needed fuel for the furnaces at Shuseikan, and charcoal was made in kilns on the wooded hills north of Kagoshima, then carried down to the factory by cart. The remains of a kiln here, part of the Meiji industrial heritage listing, show how a traditional craft was bent to the service of the new age.
Read the complete Shuseikan/ Terayama Charcoal Kiln write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Shuseikan/ Terayama Charcoal Kiln is where the day begins. Next is Sakitsu Village in Amakusa.
A small Gothic church with a spire stands right at the water's edge in Sakitsu, a fishing village tucked into an inlet on the southern coast of Amakusa's Shimoshima island. It looks almost Breton, a surprise in rural Kyushu, and the story behind it is one of the most moving in Japanese history. When Christianity was banned in the early seventeenth century, the people of Sakitsu kept their faith in secret for over two centuries, disguising prayers and objects as Buddhist or Shinto practice, and using things from their own fishing life, such as abalone shells whose inner patterns recalled holy images, as objects of devotion.
Read the complete Sakitsu Village in Amakusa write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Sakitsu Village in Amakusa comes up about 144 km into the recorded legs. 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.
about 281 km into the recorded legs you reach Takashima Coal Mine/ Takashima Coal Mine. Next is back through Sakitsu Village in Amakusa.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Sakitsu Village in Amakusa write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Sakitsu Village in Amakusa, late in the day. Next is Shuseikan/ Terayama Charcoal Kiln.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Shuseikan/ Terayama Charcoal Kiln write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Back at Shuseikan/ Terayama Charcoal Kiln. That is the ride.
Shuseikan/ Terayama Charcoal Kiln → Sakitsu Village in Amakusa is 144 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Sakitsu Village in Amakusa → Takashima Coal Mine/ Takashima Coal Mine is 137 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Takashima Coal Mine/ Takashima Coal Mine → back through Sakitsu Village in Amakusa is 137 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Sakitsu Village in Amakusa → Shuseikan/ Terayama Charcoal Kiln is 144 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.