Japan – 6000 miles on a bicycle

For those of you living in the Tokyo area, with an interest in Japan, cycling or both, there is an event coming up this weekend which will look at an extraordinary adventure.

Leigh Norrie an English teacher decided to take a ride on his bike. Not just any ride, mind you. he decided to ride all the way across Japan. Riding through all 47 prefectures (including the 2 fus, the do and to). Starting in Saitama and working his way north all the way to Hokkaido, and then back down the Sea of Japan coast as far as Shikoku, Kyushu and Okinawa (it is safe to assume some ferries were involved here). The adventure took over a year of careful planning, a lot of which went by the wayside, and some great stories afterward. As Norrie said, “I wanted to experiment on myself by going on a long, tough adventure, completely self-reliant and alone.”

Once the ride was done Norrie sat down and decided that he needed to gather all his journal entries together and collate then in a book “Japan—6,000 Miles on a Bicycle”.

Some of these stories involve the usual, getting caught sleeping in people’s backyards, meeting up with other random travelers and cyclists along the way. One section, however, displays just how tough this journey must have been. The author gets caught trying to ride along the coast during a typhoon in September 2005:

I could hear myself breathing heavily, as though earplugs had just exploded out of my lugholes. The trees around me were dancing wildly, but it was deathly silent. I started making a video diary as the sun burst through a skylight in the chaos above my head. A few minutes later—overpowering gusts made me curse, laugh and scream at the same time. Everything about this day will stay with me forever: the incredible, sinister sound of wind whistling and groaning through the barriers and branches; the sight of the grass on the banks moving like a helicopter was taking off; and the awesome sight of the ocean escaping into the coastline. This was a living beast and I had total and utmost respect. Everything that’s important in life was suddenly thrust into my eyeballs.

Episodes like this are captured in such a way that you feel a part of it, and half way through the book, you feel yourself willing Leigh on for those few more thrusts of the pedals necessary to get him to the next town and the warm comfort of a hotel, if there is a room available.

The book is to be launched at 6pm on Sunday May 18, at “What the Dickens” in Ebisu. Entry is ¥2500 per person which entitles the purchaser to a copy of the book and a drink. 25% of all money taken will go to the Chi-ki Children’s Foundation, a very worthwhile cause. Hope to see you all there!