Japan Motorcycle Tour

Twelve nights across central Honshu, guided, from Tokyo to Kyoto and back on a Japanese touring motorcycle.

Japan rewards a motorcycle more than almost anywhere. The surfaces are immaculate, the mountain roads are endless, the drivers are courteous, and the country is small enough that a fortnight covers a genuine cross-section of it rather than a corridor.

Tokyo opens it, with the arcades, the neon and the Blade Runner atmosphere the operator makes a point of. The route then climbs into the Japanese Alps, through narrow river valleys and scenic passes, past Shinto shrines, spa towns built around volcanic hot springs and villages that still carry their Edo-era character. The Yamaha and Honda museums fall on the way, which on a tour of this kind is the obvious pilgrimage. The north coast follows, with riding on the hard sand of the Sea of Japan shore, then the route turns south past Lake Biwa, the largest lake in the country, to Kyoto and on to Nara, the older capital, where the deer wander freely among the shrines. The return to Tokyo runs along the Pacific with Mount Fuji behind it.

Twelve nights across Western-style city hotels and countryside stays with futon beds and onsen baths, ten days of long-distance touring motorcycle rental, a luggage support vehicle, and guiding by both local and operator guides are all included. Spring and autumn are the two departure windows, which is right: Japan in May has the mountain roads at their best, and October brings the autumn colour. Thirteen days with ten of them riding is a lot of saddle time, and the onsen nights are not a luxury but a practical recovery. The operator’s own page gives twelve nights against the thirteen recorded here, which is worth reconciling.