CURVESCOUT / MOTORCYCLE RIDE
The recorded total and the leg detail need reconciliation. Inspect the leg notes before using this record for timing or navigation. 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.
From Hachiōji it runs 439 km to Ōme; allow about 10 h 39 of riding. It goes by way of Okutama lake road, Chichibu forest bend core, Nagatoro river stop and Ome exit roads. Daibosatsu high line is the high point. It tops out at about 1,150 m.
Slow enough to look. The surface follows the shoreline, so the corners arrive where the water decided, not where an engineer did. Water arrives beside the road and stays for 52 km. The line follows the shore because there is nowhere else for it to go.
Mount Takao stands at the edge of Hachiōji like a patient dog, a green hill of about six hundred metres that Tokyoites climb in their hundreds of thousands. For a rider, it is a start and finish point, a convenient place for fuel, parking and a good bowl of ramen before the mountains begin. The city sits at the foot of the Tama hills, and the climate here is a few degrees cooler than central Tokyo.
Read the complete Hachioji fuel gate write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Hachioji is where the day begins. Next is Okutama lake road.
The Ome Kaido, Route 411, is the road that leads from the western suburbs of Tokyo up into the Okutama mountains, and it follows the Tama river most of the way, with the valley narrowing and the slopes steepening mile by mile. This stop falls on the lake road, with Itsukaichi and Ome some seventeen kilometres behind, and the air at this point is noticeably cooler and cleaner than in the city. The ride out from the suburbs takes an hour or more on a busy day, and the reward is a different world.
Read the complete Okutama lake road write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Okutama lake road comes up 43 km in. Next is Chichibu forest bend core.
Chichibu sits in a high basin ringed by mountains, a town of fifty-eight thousand people that feels more like a market town in the Alps than a place two hours from Tokyo. The ground here is limestone, and to the south the bulk of Mount Buko has been quarried for cement for a century, a vast scar on the hillside that is visible from miles away. The industry made the town prosperous, and it also sits beside a river, the Arakawa, that begins in the mountains above and flows down toward the capital.
Read the complete Chichibu forest bend core write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
86 km in you reach Chichibu forest bend core. Next is Nagatoro river stop.
Nagatoro is a small town on the Arakawa River, at the point where the water leaves the Chichibu mountains and cuts through a long stretch of flat, banded rock. The riverbed here is made of crystalline schist, a pale green stone laid down in broad stepped terraces, known as Iwadatami, or rock tatami, because it looks like a floor of giant mats. Geologists have studied the formation for well over a century, and it is among the most celebrated rock exposures in Japan.
Read the complete Nagatoro river stop write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Nagatoro river stop, about halfway. Next is Back to Hachioji.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Hachioji fuel gate write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Finish at Back to Hachioji. That is the ride. Next is Ome exit roads.
At the end of a day in the mountains, the Tama valley delivers you back to Ōme like a conveyor belt. For a rider coming down from Okutama, it is the place where the road widens, the traffic thickens and the first petrol stations appear, a signal that the mountains are done for the day. Fuel here is no problem, with stations on every main road, and Fussa and Hannō are close.
Read the complete Ome exit roads write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Ome exit roads is the fuel stop for this leg. Next is Okutama Lake.
Few people riding beside Lake Okutama realise that they are looking at the roof of a drowned valley. The lake exists because of the Ogouchi dam, built across the Tama river in the 1950s to give Tokyo more drinking water, and when the gates closed, the rising water covered farms, a shrine and a handful of villages. Several hundred households were moved to higher ground, and old photographs show the fields and houses that vanished. It is a quiet piece of postwar history, and it explains the unusual stillness of the place.
Read the complete Okutama Lake write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
258 km in you reach Okutama Lake. Next is Daibosatsu high line.
Daibosatsu, the Great Bodhisattva, gives its name to a pass, a lake and a ridge on the Yamanashi side of the Okutama and Chichibu mountains, and the high line here follows the ridge for much of the way, with broad views to the south and the great dark shapes of the Southern Alps on the western horizon.
Read the complete Daibosatsu high line write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Daibosatsu high line, about halfway. Next is Chichibu valley food.
If Chichibu has a signature dish, it is waraji katsudon, a pair of large, flat pork cutlets laid across a bowl of rice and glazed in a sweet soy sauce, named for the straw sandals, waraji, that they resemble in shape. It is a big meal, enough for any hungry rider after a morning in the mountains, and restaurants in the town centre serve it with miso soup and pickles. The portion is generous, and a small amount of sauce and a lot of appetite are all you need.
Read the complete Chichibu valley food write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Food at 344 km, roughly 6 hours into the riding. Next is Nagatoro river bends.
Nagatoro is a small town of seven thousand people in Saitama Prefecture, at the point where the Arakawa River squeezes through a gorge of layered rock, and it has been a day-trip destination for Tokyoites for more than a century. The name means something like long rock bed, and it describes the scene accurately: the river runs over broad shelves of crystalline schist, worn into smooth steps and pools, with cliffs of dark green stone along the bank. In the nineteenth century, geologists came to study the rock; now people come to float on it.
Read the complete Nagatoro river bends write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Nagatoro river bends comes up 387 km in. Next is Back to Ome exit roads.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Ome exit roads write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Finish at Back to Ome exit roads. That is the ride.
Hachioji fuel gate → Okutama lake road is 50 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Okutama lake road → Chichibu forest bend core is 37 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Chichibu forest bend core → Nagatoro river stop is 23 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Nagatoro river stop → Back to Hachioji is 90 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Back to Hachioji → Ome exit roads is 26 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Ome exit roads → Okutama Lake is 40 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Okutama Lake → Daibosatsu high line is 14 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Daibosatsu high line → Chichibu valley food is 51 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Chichibu valley food → Nagatoro river bends is 19 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Nagatoro river bends → Back to Ome exit roads is 61 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.