Cycling across Japan - From Soya to Sata

As you know by now, Yumi and I will cycle from the Northern most to the Southern most tip of Japan.

What is it going to be like? To be honest, I don't know.

What I know is that it's going to be about 3,700 km long. That's about 2,500 miles, but even these numbers don't really talk to me, so I did a bit of research:

3,700 kilometers is the equivalent of:

= Madrid (Spain) to Helsinki (Finland)

= New York to Las Vegas

= John O'Groats to Lands End, a tiny bit less than 3 times
= Paris to Toulouse, times 6
= A lot

Japan's countryside is said to be breathtaking, (which is probably because of the mountainous terrain) and the best way to discover it was to cycle. It all started from the idea to cycle from Tokyo to Makurazaki, where Yumi's family is from, but then we asked each other the question "how many times in our lifetime will we get the chance to cycle all the way across Japan?". Now I think about it, maybe I asked myself this question. Anyway, Yumi agreed on the idea in no time.

Since we were going to start such journey, Yumi mentioned it would be good to do it for a charity, and very quickly, we decided to do it for Advance, for which she's been working over the past 6 years.

In terms of the route, we've been advised to avoid Nagano to Nagoya, as there are plenty of tunnels and it not so cyclist-friendly, so we'll probably go down the west coast of Japan before arriving in Kyoto.

That's it for now.

Ga-la-pa...What? ... Ok!

I met my friend Philippe for a drink a few days ago and got told off for going to South America but not to the Galapagos Islands. I tried to argue that time and money would make it tough to fit it in and Philippe being the fine negotiator he is, said it'd be a good and convenience place for everybody to meet up.

"Why not?" I though; so as soon as I got back home that night, I jumped on my computer and looked into how we could add this world heritage site to our already incredible journey.

I'm not sure yet how this is gonna work, but I'm sure it will. Somehow.

Whoops - we did it again

Cycling during the hottest month in Japan and crossing Mongolia when it is barely 0º was not the best idea, so after some thinking, we've thought about a new route. it's not better, it just makes more sense! I will not dare say it's "final" though..

So, for the update, it will be China, then Mongolia, then China again and Japan.

Voila.

Van in New Zealand is booked

My bank account statement reminded me that our van has been booked for New Zealand. I know it's in April, but the sooner the better, we got a sweet deal too. Woo hoo!

This is gonna be our home for a month. Don't be fooled though, it's top comfort!
3 bedroom with one en-suite, lounge, bowling alley (in the basement) and a massive garden. :)

RTW - 2.0

This time it's booked, so it shouldn't change too much :)
See below:

THAT'S IT!!!

Yumi and I went to Trailfinder in High Street Kensington and guess what happened?

Yes you guessed, we bought our round the world tickets! Woo hoo!

So that's it, we are airborne! Well, almost.

We'll leave London on January 7th 2011 and our journey will take us to Argentina (via Sao Paulo), Chile, Bolivia, Peru, New Zealand, Australia, Thailand, Myanmar, Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam, China, Hong Kong, Tokyo, South Korea, China (again), Tibet, Mongolia, China (again, again), France...and England.

Voila!
Bye for now

:)

Yumi got Jabbed!

Yellow fever, japanese encephalitis, rabies, Hep A, Hep B, Typhoid....blahblah blah.

Yumi started the jab race! We thought it's better to be safe than sorry on this one, especially when we'll be in the rainforest in Peru and in South East Asia. We just didn't expect to spent about 500 pounds on jabs alone!