Journey's in Hokkaido

I had been planning to a bike tour in Hokkaido for many years, and finally I had the time! I managed to combine a 6 day tour with a week long triathlon camp organised by the Tritons Tri club in HK.

After taking the train North to Hachinohe I took the overnight ferry to Tomokamai.

Day 1. 96km - Cruisy ride.

Perfect cycling country.

I headed east along the coast, hoping to find the much talked about roads that were perfectly paved, had no cars, and were surrounded by glorious Hokkaido countryside. So I was rather disappointed with the first 30km as all I had managed to find was large industrial roads with no decent hard shoulder and too many fast cars...what had gone wrong? The spectacular riding I had heard about where was it?

Then at the 30 km mark I decided to make a sharp left, it was a life changing left turn, the roads became empty, the scenery turned into rural Japan, the sun was shining..I had found it cycling nirvana.

I road through to Hidaka, where 90% of Japan's horses are bred and trained. Settled into the youth hostel for the night and started my 2nd journey into the basics of Kanji.

Day 2. 70km - Hardest gear all the way.

About 30m visibility...Great!!

Hokkaido is a big island (most people tour it on motorbike's) so it was impossible for me to get all the way round in this trip, but I was damn sure I was going to hit at least 1 corner, and as I was already east so  cape Erimo Miyasaki it was. I took the train as far as I could and started my ride, unfortunately the weather didn't play ball, and after getting drenched, I got to the cape to see a curtain of mist/fog/rain/cloud.

I had ridden through quite a few villages along the coast, and was surprised to see how poor and quiet they were, the average age looked to be 70+ and most people were fisherman drying out seaweed by the roadside, not the picture of modern Japan you would expect.



Day 3. 65km - Hilly ride, 45mins in hardest gear whilst on the uphills.

THX 1138

I left a bright and sunny Tomokamai to ride to Lake Toya, this was going to be a hard ride up through the HoruHoru national park. It was a large change in scenery from the horse farms and coastal towns of east Japan, I was now into the mountains with all the waterfalls, and greenery that Japan does best.
That was until I came across this amazing futuristic tunnel at the top of the national park, it was like something out of THX-1138...only in Japan!








Day 4. 73km - undulating, cruisy pace, with 8*10secs ALL OUT.

Rode from the cloudy shores of Lake Toya and headed north to Hirafu for the start of my triathlon camp. Definitely felt a bit sore and tired on the power cranks. I have been to Hirafu many times during the winter I had never seen it in summer, it was not a disappointment. Yotei greeted me (well at least the bottom of it did) as the top was covered in cloud, here it is on day 7 in all its glory, a cracking sight.




Day 5. 52km on the bike (16km Lactate threshold time trial), 30minute LT run, Easy swim
First day of the triathlon camp, and not an easy one to start. We rode out to the farm roads near hirafu and after a decent warm up, did a 16km lactate threshold TT, I rode in 25:18. Then on the afternoon another LT test but this time on the run, it was a 30minute hard pace run. My results were 155bpm for both bike and run. The run felt a bit low (but probably due to me being tired). Easy 1km swim in the pool.

Day 6 . 95km ride, 1.5km swim in lake Toya
Rode from hirafu back to Lake Toya today, took some amazing fast flat empty farm roads, perfect for TT racing. Had my 2nd swim in lake Toya the visibility is amazing and no wetsuit needed. The ride on the way home not surprisingly hotted up on these perfect roads, myself, Bevan, Graham, Nick the coach and Jess were gunning it all  the way home, I ended up falling off the back of this pack, but was happy to average about 37kmh all the way home.

Day 7. 117km Long ride. Open water swim 1km.

Early start today as a long ride was planned. We rode from Hirafu through Konbu towards the very impressive Windsor hotel where the G8 summit was hosted in 2008. After some super fast flat roads, we encountered 18% gradients getting up to the hotel, we were rewarded with a pretty much empty 5 star hotel, that had a great bakery. Only in Japan do they let 7 gaijin into such an amazing hotel in our cycling gear.
We finished the day with a 1km open water swim, and underwater running drill set...starting to get tired....


Day 8. 20km easy ride, run conditioning session, 1km swim drills
Easier day today and needed it aswell. The run conditioning was all about fore foot running, increased cadence and slightly shorter stride.

Day 9. Race day. 2 sprints (500m swim, 13km bike, 3km run).
Time to put all of this training into practice. I was disappointed at first not to do a longer race at least Olympic, the sprints actually turned out to be good fun. The swims in lake Toya


Day10. Long run 1:30hour's.
Last day of the camp today, long run, and a good brunch. Managed to get a good sports massage in aswell. 4 hours of Kanji practice and then a few beers for the Bledisloe cup...cracking day.


Day11. 82km Cruisy ride.

My last look at Yotei.

My last day of the tour, with the camp finishing yesterday I left a very quiet Hirafu. Rode up to Annupuri to go and check out Annupuri village and the new Capella resort. Big money is certainly changing hands in that region.
It was a windy ride into Lake toya, where I took the overnight train back into Ueno. Harder ride than I wanted for my last day 82km's into wind on the power cranks...ouch.








700km + over 11 days, with over half being on power cranks, not a bad session. I certainly feel a lot stronger in the saddle, will get to test that next weekend in Japan 70.3. Studied all of JLPT level 5 kanji.....bring on level 4.