Today is Sports Day, a national holiday, and anyway I have the entire week off. I told Nana I’d be leaving at 7 a.m., but I let her sleep in until nearly 7, and then departed just after 8.

It was a beautiful day with blue skies and mild weather. The only clouds were those hiding Fujisan.

At the first rest stop, I was feeling vaguely hungry. OK, decided I’d have some of Nana’s world-famous onigiri once I reached the confluence of the Asakawa with the Tamagawa.

Beeeeg mistake. I was really hungry! I’d eaten a large breakfast at 5 a.m. and it was nearing 10. I stopped a few kilometers shy of the confluence and hastily downed a couple of onigiri before continuing.

I was riding upwind once I turned up the Asakawa, which slowed me a bit but didn’t bring me to a standstill. The path was crowded with pedestrians, including a lot of young children, and I had to keep my wits about me. At Asakawa Riverbed Grass Field (sorry, direct translation), I stopped for a rest and ate the last of the onigiri. I messaged Nana that I would be at the top of the mountain in 90 minutes, and saddled up.

The big push

I’d been debating with myself all the way up the Tamagawa and Asakawa if I would actually climb Takaosan up to Otarumi Touge. I hadn’t made the climb since April 2023, and I’d been up to Takaosan Guchi twice in the meantime.

But once I left the path and joined Koshu Kaido into Takaosan, there was no question. Well, no question that I was going for it. How long that would take and how many breaks I would have on the way up were still open questions. I was shifting down earlier in the climb than I have in the past, and the row of love hotels came much later than I was expecting. I stopped for a breather in the drive of the last love hotel, and I think the last time I did that I turned around and called it a day.

This time I pressed onwards. My legs felt refreshed by the rest, which was welcome. I’ve had the experience of mounting up after a rest mid-climb and having my thighs feeling like linguine. It’s a bit hard to say definitively from the GPS record, but I think I stopped no fewer than five times on the way up. The last rest was within a couple hundred meters of the finish line, which I well knew. But I also knew that I had a choice of struggling around the last bend, wobbling in the traffic, or having a brief break and then making a strong showing.

I rested briefly at the mountain pass. Reception is not good, and the photos I’d taken were not posting well to friends and Instagram. I messaged Nana I was on my way back, but would not be home before 4.

I made very good time on the way back down the climb, coming within one second of my personal best and averaging 44km/h, with a high of 52.

Takaosan was unsurprisingly crowded given the holiday. I grabbed my snap and continued on to the convenience store, where I supplemented Nana’s onigiri with ham-and-cheese rolls. With my water bottles topped up, I continued on towards home.

I made much better time on the homeward leg. I had both gravity and the wind working in my favor. I still had a number of senior citizens, children and dogs to negotiate along the way. (Seriously, people, it is never OK to have your dog lead stretched across the width of the path.) I was flying, but I was also fatigued. My thighs hurt, my hands hurt, my butt hurt, and my neck was getting tired of holding my head up. I took my breaks at the usual locations, and I took some extra time to make sure I was feeling well before continuing.

I reached the last rest stop at 2:50 and polished off a couple of mini pudding cups that Nana had stashed in my bag. I topped up one water bottle and messaged Nana that I would be home between 4 and 4:30 (expecting to make it before 4). I was struggling with the modest rises and the immodest traffic after that, but I was progressing. The clouds were getting darker and at times I could see Kuroko’s headlight kicking in. But there was no threat of rain, and when the going was level I was making good time.

I stopped the clock at 4:02 p.m. and let Nana know I was home. Not quite the goal I’d set myself, but well within the time I’d told her to expect me. I was exhausted and feeling quite a bit of aching from my thighs, so for the first time this season I had a long soak in the tub following the ride.

On a moving time of 5:45:26, I averaged 19.8km/h. I’d be an idiot not to be happy with that. I’m making negative progress on repeating my triumph of surmounting Otarumi Touge in a single go, but given the adverse directions of my age and weight, that’s no surprise. What I learned today and last weekend in Chiba is to enjoy the ride anyway, even if I have a tough go of the climbs.

Bonus: Let there be light!

Today’s ride was the first after having re-soldered the wiring for Kuroko’s dynamo lights. I set the headlight to the on position when setting out this morning, more expecting it to fail than otherwise. But after a couple of kilometers when I put my hand in front of the light, I could see it was lit! I checked the taillight at the next stoplight, and it was glowing as well.

I couldn’t make out the headlight well in today’s bright sunlight, but I verified it was indeed lighting. And so I switched it to the auto position, where it would only turn on as needed. There were no tunnels on today’s route, but I checked while traversing an underpass, and the headlight lit up. As the day progressed and the shadows lengthened, it would light up from time to time (as noted above) and I could make out a patch of light on the pavement in front of me.

This is the triumph of the Forking Dynamite project, and at last I can move into the endgame: Bling! I’m going to rewrap the handlebars (long overdue), try out a small handlebar bag, and then add a little something extra.