The next big adventure will be Kyoto-Nara-Osaka-Kyoto, a two-day trip at the end of this month together with L2P veterans Fearless Leader Joe and Sanborn. My plan is to ship the bike out and follow on by shinkansen. The lads had discussed (and more recently apparently affirmed) staying in tents for the night, but in my last discussion with FLJ he encouraged me to find a cheap hotel nearby in which to stay. Good — from my point of view, less to pack and carry (and I can show up in the morning freshly showered and full of kaiseki).

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— DJ Feldmeyer (@djfoheso) May 1, 2016

I’ll be leaving navigational duties to Kyoto residents Joe and Sanborn, so that leaves me with three basic tasks:

1. Order the bike delivery
2. Order the shinkansen tickets
3. Book the hotel

My days have been quite full recently, including the weekends, and — together with a dash of procrastination — I’m just getting around to the list tonight. Tackling things in order, first up is ordering the bike delivery. I’d done this for Tour de Tohoku, a scheduled event, and it was fairly easy to book. The service wasn’t the greatest — the bike was jounced around a bit in transit — but basically everything was delivered on or ahead of schedule and in one piece. This time around, with no scheduled event, it was up to me to create a user account (by the end of which process I had six tabs open to the deliverer’s various websites), enter the dates and addresses, and of course whip out the credit card in the end. (That part was the same, but it was a tad cheaper this time.)

And I’m done with that bit. I’ve got the confirmation, which I’ve forwarded on to FLJ (since he’ll be hosting Kuroko between the delivery and my arrival, and the two of us for an additional day once the ride is over). Now, who knows when I’ll get around to Step Nos. 2 & 3? At least I have an excuse on Step No. 3 as I’m waiting for FLJ to confirm the location, and he and Sanborn have just come back from a reprise of Lake Biwa.