Chichibu Muse Park and Nagatoro
A 192 km loop
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Why this ride
Leave the city behind and spend the day on roads with texture. Out of Tokyo and back again: 192 km, roughly 3 h 29 in the saddle. The stops in between: Chichibu and Nagatoro.
Roadbook
- Tokyo
start
Every ride from Tokyo begins with a negotiation. The roads are good and the drivers are disciplined, but traffic lights are many and the pace is steady rather than fast, so patience is part of the toolkit. A Sunday dawn is the easiest time to slip away.
Tokyo is a city of more than thirteen million, and the metropolitan area around it is the largest in the world. It was once the fishing village of Edo, and it became the seat of the Tokugawa shogunate in the early seventeenth century, then Japan's capital in 1868. That history is visible in odd places: a small shrine tucked between apartment blocks, a stretch of old canal, a temple with incense drifting over a car park. For a rider, it is worth looking up between traffic lights.
Practicalities are simple, because everything is close. Fuel stations are everywhere, with attendants at many of them, and the city's convenience stores sell hot coffee, rice balls and sandwiches at any hour. The expressways are tolled, and an electronic toll card makes them smoother, though paying at the booth works. Parking for motorcycles is trickier than in many places, so choose a hotel with a bike space in advance and check the rules before leaving the bike anywhere on the street.
Once you reach the open road, the contrast is striking. Heading south-west along the coast toward the Izu Peninsula, the landscape changes from concrete to hills, tangerine groves and sea views, with Mount Fuji appearing on clear days. The best time to ride is autumn, when the air is dry and cool and the visibility is highest, and spring, when the cherry blossom runs up the coast. Summer is hot and humid, and the rainy season in June can be grey and heavy, so pack proper waterproofs.
- Chichibu
sight
Every December, on the night of the third, giant wooden floats lit with lanterns are hauled through the streets of Chichibu to the beat of drums and the crackle of fireworks, in a festival that is among the most famous in Japan. The Chichibu Night Festival has been held for centuries, and it draws huge crowds. The rest of the year, Chichibu is a quiet mountain town in a basin west of Tokyo, ringed by forested peaks.
Mount Buko, which looms over the town, has been quarried for limestone for decades, and its summit has been cut away into terraces, a scarred profile that dominates the view. The cement industry was a mainstay of the local economy. Chichibu is also a pilgrimage centre, with a circuit of thirty-four temples dedicated to Kannon, the goddess of mercy, scattered through the valleys.
In spring, Hitsujiyama park is covered with a carpet of pink and white moss phlox, shibazakura, and the crowds come to see it. Nagatoro, to the north, has river boats that shoot the rapids of the Arakawa between flat rock formations.
The food is hearty and local: waraji katsu, a pork cutlet as big as a straw sandal, served over rice, and soba from local buckwheat. Chichibu also makes whisky, and a small distillery has won international prizes.
For riders, the roads around Chichibu are among the best near Tokyo. Route 299 climbs over the mountains to the east, and Route 140 heads west through a long tunnel into Yamanashi. Both are winding, well surfaced and busy with riders on weekends, and the police know it. In winter, watch for ice on shaded corners. Fill the tank in town: once you are on the passes, stations are scarce.
- Nagatoro
food
Nagatoro is a small town in the hills of western Saitama where the Arakawa river squeezes through a gorge of layered grey-green rock, and that rock is the reason the place is famous. Along the riverbank lies the Iwadatami, a broad flat terrace of crystalline schist, worn smooth by the water and split into slabs like stepping stones, and it is a national natural monument. Japanese geologists have studied it since the late nineteenth century, and Nagatoro calls itself the birthplace of Japanese geology, with the Saitama Museum of Natural History right in town.
The river is the show. Flat-bottomed wooden boats, steered by boatmen with long poles, carry visitors down the rapids between the rock walls, and in summer there is rafting and canoeing. The water is clear and green, and on hot days families sit on the rocks with their feet in it. In autumn, the maples along the gorge turn red, and in spring cherry blossoms line the river and the road. Above the town, a ropeway climbs Mount Hodo, where wintersweet flowers bloom in January and February, and the Hodosan shrine sits among old trees at its foot.
As a food stop, Nagatoro and the Chichibu area have their own specialities. Kakigori, shaved ice, is a summer ritual here, made from natural ice harvested in winter from ponds in the mountains, light and fluffy and topped with syrups. Chichibu is also known for miso potatoes, fried and coated in sweet miso sauce, and for waraji katsu, huge breaded pork cutlets shaped like straw sandals. Soba noodles made from local buckwheat are another good choice, cold on a hot day or hot in winter.
The riding to and from Nagatoro is a pleasure. Route 140 follows the Arakawa valley from Yorii, with gentle bends, good surfaces and views of the river, and the roads up into the Chichibu mountains climb through forests to passes and lookout points, with tight corners and very little traffic on weekdays. Chichibu Muse Park, on a ridge above the city of Chichibu, has wide views over the basin and the mountains. On weekends, the main roads can be busy with day-trippers from Tokyo.
Nagatoro has fuel, convenience stores and many small restaurants and cafés along the main street near the station. Arrive early, before the tour buses, and watch the boats glide through the gorge in the morning light.
- Tokyo finish