It's that time again....

Here we go again!

After an unbelievably busy year, we are about to take a much-needed break from our daily routine to do another cycling trip  across the beautiful country of Japan. With perhaps the least amount of training and preparation yet, we'll be pedaling our way from the capital city of Tokyo down and around Mt. Fuji, then along the shores of the Pacific Ocean to the historic city of Kyoto.

We think.

Two days ago that sentence read "we'll be pedaling our way from the capital city of Tokyo up to the beautiful mountains of Nikko, then across the Japan Alps to the olympic city of Nagano". It looks like traveling down towards Kansai would fit in better with the end of our trip, where we'll be visiting an old friend for a few days in the Kobe area before heading back to Tokyo. We've also never seen Mt. Fuji up close and only had a day in Kyoto the last time we were down there a number of years ago, and have several things we'd like to see, including Fushimi Inari-taisha, a famous shrine that dates back to the 8th century and was used in the filming of Memoirs of a Geisha.

We have done very little riding, mostly because of my terrible school schedule this year and are basically not ready for a long trip. I brought our bikes in to the shop last week Monday to get them tuned up. While the technician was looking over our well-used Bike Fridays, he asked where we were going and for how long. When I told him Japan for two weeks of mountain cycling, he said "not on these, your not."....hm.

Turns out all the gears on our bikes looked less like shark's teeth and more like sine waves. Apparently riding a few thousand miles through mountains with 50 lb. trailers can wear down gears. Who knew? Anyway, the good news is, once he replaces the gears, rear cassette and the brake and shifter cables, our bikes will be like new again and my wallet will be light enough to float like a 1¥ coin. They will be ready Wednesday afternoon. We leave Thursday. This will be interesting. Now, we will be doing some riding over the next few days on our full-sized bikes, to desperately get in some sort of cycling shape, but we'll be pretty green when we start next Saturday. In the immortal words of the legendary adventurer, Mario:

"Here we go!"