Saturday was our last promised rain-free day for more than a week, so I was up early and on the road with a saddlebag full of onigiri. I wanted to be home in plenty of time for our dinner plans, but I was also feeling it wasn’t a day for big challenges.
It was nearly 24C when I set out at 8 a.m., with a promised high of 28-30. My goal for the day, apart from getting in some easy kilometers, was to keep my UV-block mask on. It was a windless day, so this immediately presented a challenge as my sunglasses began to fog up at each traffic light. I was fine when I was moving, but the moment I stopped it became a race between the cycle of lights and my breath clouding up my lenses.
I’m happy to report that I arrived at the Arakawa without incident. (I did pull my mask down at the lights where it was making a problem, but then pulled it up again before I began moving.) For the next hour, foggy lenses were the furthest thing from my mind as I spun my way 25km downstream. Without pushing myself, I was averaging 26-27km/h on the flat, broad pavement. That’s a good enough speed that I wondered if I had the wind at my back, but the tall grasses along the path were standing straight and still. I stopped once at my usual spot in the shade to rest my hands and drink some water.
There were lots of other bicyclists and runners on the path, and of course the baseball fields were overrun by little-leaguers, but I didn’t encounter any marathons, for a nice change.
I arrived at Shinsuna at 10 a.m. and made a note of the time. I wanted to see how long it would take me to get from there to Disneyland and then back to the river. In November when Fearless Leader Joe accompanied me to this spot, I’d estimated an hour. We decided on that occasion not to continue on the Disney jaunt to ensure that FLJ could get back to Saitama before the sunset. On this ride, though, I knew I was well ahead of schedule.
Rickety-tickety
I’d been hearing a quiet ticking noise on my way down the river, and by the time I arrived at Shinsuna I’d figured it was time to check the spokes on the new rear wheel. I gave them all a squeeze and sure enough I located one that had quite a bit more give in it than all its neighbors. I gave it a few turns with the multitool and checked the wheel for roundness. It all seemed good, so I continued back to the bridge that takes me across the river and on towards Disneyland.
It was 10:30 when I arrived at Tokyo Disney Resort, and considerably hotter than it had been when I left home. I was also getting hungry. On my way back to a park by the river, I was hallucinating about the onigiri in my saddlebag. I took a shortcut back to the river and arrived at the park at 10:45. I tucked right in to the onigiri and finished all three in less than 15 minutes, putting me back on the road at 11 with just a few swallows of water left in my bottles.
Routine
Crossing the bridge back into Tokyo just brought me into traffic, and lots of it. It’s a long stretch on Eitai Dori but nothing really challenging. Some idiot in his BMW honked at me when I switched lanes to go around a parked car, after checking for traffic and making a hand signal — he had another full lane to go around me, but just wanted to demonstrate what a spoiled child he was. Nothing more of note happened as I continued on, first to Nihonbashi and then up Kudanzaka to Budokan.
At Chidorigafuchi I sipped the last of my water and posted the requisite pictures before continuing on my way. I arrived home just four and a half hours after having set out, hot and tired and ready for a shower and cold drink.
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