Welcome

The plan today is to traverse the entire inland plain of Akita from South to North. It is about as flat a day as you can get.  In the morning the rivers and irrigation canals were running in the same direction we were riding, which…

Japan is not renowned for its public conveniences.  It's much better than my first visit in the 90s when public toilets were almost non existent.  Nevertheless, on our journeys this trip, much reliance was placed on the pervasive network of convenience stores for comfort stops. …

I know the whole breaking the bike down so it fits into a rinko bag and dragging it and your panniers onto a train is a PITA.  But trust me, if you are intending on riding this route, catching the train from Kiyokawa to Furukuchi…

For Australians of a certain age, the word Sakata immediately brings to mind a particularly bad TV advertising jingle for rice crackers.  When it became clear we'd not only be passing through a town called Sakata but staying a night or two, I joked to…

The running joke is that I'm made out of icing sugar, because I don't like to ride in the rain.  While we've had a few rainy days before now, they haven't been heavy rain where your socks are saturated and squelchy and the touchscreen devices…