What's new

Ride The "Don't go chasing waterfalls" ride

leicaman

Maximum Pace
Sep 20, 2012
2,878
2,698
Yesterday was a national holiday. I usually have to work national hoildays but yesterday was an exception. I couple of weeks back, I had planned to go to Gunma with a few friends to do what looked like a fantastic ride up towards Kusatsu. On Sunday evening I got an email from one of the guys saying that he was sick and would most probably not be able to make the Tuesday ride. We decided to cancel the Gunma trip.

For quite a while now, @saibot has been bumbling on about wanting to tackle a climb that starts in Enzan and finishes on a ridegeline between Mt.Kinpu and Mt.Kobu-Shigatake. I think he heard about it from @Stormy . I think Tobias wanted to get the train out rom Tokyo to Enzan, do the climb, descent then get the train home.......but oh no! That's not how it works. Instead, I thought it would be a better "well rounded" ride if we cycled from home, down to Oume, past Okutama then up the 411 to Yanagisawa Pass and down the Daibosatsu Line to Enzan before tackling the main climb. The plan was then to descent back to Enzan, whereupon we would get a train back home.

We met up at 7am in Asaka city then headed up the 109 to the 179 which took us down towards Oume. From there we jumped on the 411 which would take us all the way to Enzan. The weather couldn't have been more perfect, blue skies with wispy cloud. We got to the Soba place at the top of Yanagisawa toge and had a spot of lunch before descending in to Enzan. The descent felt like it would go on forever as we were descending from 1400m to 400m. We finally made it to the bottom and I decided to stuff my face at a convenience store before starting the main climb of the day. Bad bad idea. Little tip for you, don't eat curry rice, followed by half of the stock of a convenience store before tackling a 30km climb. I got stomach cramps a few km in but luckily they did abate further after around 15km.

I really am surprised that I had never seen this climb on TCC before. The road is fantastic and it is a super long climb. Apparently, the Strava segment for the climb is 27km but we started 3km further down the road which made it a tad over 30km in total. I encourage all those who enjoy the mountains to try this climb. She is a beaut.

As my stomach cramps began to go away, I started to enjoy the climb much more and I felt pretty fresh as we reached the top at an apparent 2365m (although my Garmin said we were just shy of 2300m, stupid gadgets).

In Enzan, the temperature was a very mediterranean 28c. At the top, the mercury had plunged to 7c. As we only had summer riding clothes, we donned our windbreakers at the top before beating a hasty retreat back down the mountain. Oh...my.....God. We were absolutely freezing. My teeth were chattering all the way back down the mountain. We stopped for the obligatory selfies on the way down. At one point, I had put my bike down on some grass at the side of the road and was bending down to take a selfie of Tobias when an old guy driving a van drove past. He slammed on his brakes and put his warning lights on. He jumped out of the van and ran over to me, asking me if I was ok and what had happened. He had obviously thought I had done an @Aron B . I thanked him for his kindness and he looked very relieved that police and ambulances weren't needed. It's nice to know people will stop and help others if need be.

We got back down to Enzan (literally all downhill from the top fo the climb) and jumped on a rather busy train heading back towards the big smoke.

All in all, a fantabulous ride that I wholeheartedly recommend.

The ride to the top of the last climb (There are only actually two climbs in the whole ride) was 146km with just over 3800m of climbing. (182km including the descent back to Enzan station).

And now for @jdd 's favourite part....The Selfies ;)

IMG_0074.JPG

Look mum, no hands selfie. Riding up the 411 towards Yanagisawa pass

IMG_0169.JPG

Can you see me selfie? Riding down the other side.

IMG_0168.JPG

The Garmin wanted a selfie. Not the kind of graph you want to see when you have stomach cramps

IMG_0164.JPG

Bicycle yoga selfie

IMG_0165.JPG

Flying selfie




Some video selfies



Gunshots from the Swede. Luckily I dodged



On the way down
 
First thing, the selfies are great, and I have no complaints about them other than they are narcissistic ritzy-glitzy-fancy-schpanzy self-admiring nonsense - and great (but not really (but really)).

But what are these moving images you are posting now though anyway what? Are they those Vines I've heard so much about? Climbing Vines perchance? Descending Vines even..;):rolleyes::sly::(:D

Who knows! Back to the aquarobaticalistics for meeeeeee.
 
narcissistic ritzy-glitzy-fancy-schpanzy self-admiring nonsense

but we are the best thing that has happened since the selfie came about, that has to be admired! You can't just ignore our awesomeness silly!

thanks @leicaman for dragging me along, had quite a few dips on that last climb.

was indeed a beautiful climb! we had a bit of bad luck as we got to the top and the clouds had covered up what I believe would have been pretty nice views

IMG_2960.JPG
 
Great ride report - thank you @leicaman and @saibot. You didn't mention the name of the pass - it's Ōdarumi-tōge (大弛峠). I want to go back there now. But it won't be this year!

This name is sufficiently similar to Ōtarumi-tōge (大垂水峠), the little bump where R20 passes over Mt. Takao, to cause mild amusement among the tōge cognoscenti - and to mess with TCC search results when everyone spells the latter wrong.

http://www.city.yamanashi.yamanashi.jp/sight/climb/others/oodarumi.html

Sadly, as you might have noticed, the Nagano side of the pass is dirt. If it weren't it would be a wonderful wilderness ride over the top and into nowhere.

QUESTION: What has this got to do with (not) chasing waterfalls already?

PROPOSAL: Why not start calling the third-person-selfie a 'proxie'?;)
 
Great ride report - thank you @leicaman and @saibot. You didn't mention the name of the pass - it's Ōdarumi-tōge (大弛峠). I want to go back there now. But it won't be this year!

This name is sufficiently similar to Ōtarumi-tōge (大垂水峠), the little bump where R20 passes over Mt. Takao, to cause mild amusement among the tōge cognoscenti - and to mess with TCC search results when everyone spells the latter wrong.

http://www.city.yamanashi.yamanashi.jp/sight/climb/others/oodarumi.html

Sadly, as you might have noticed, the Nagano side of the pass is dirt. If it weren't it would be a wonderful wilderness ride over the top and into nowhere.

QUESTION: What has this got to do with (not) chasing waterfalls already?
;)
PROPOSAL: Why not start calling the third-person-selfie a 'proxie'?
Ah thanks for the name clarification, I thought I heard it plenty before, but would certainly be about Ōtarumi-tōge.

We knew that we're weren't going to go down the other side, but looking at the map, if it where paved, man there would have been some insane switchbacks to cruise around. Shame shame.

The waterfall thing is me have this undying urge to take a selfie near, under, on the side of a waterfall with the bike in hand... that lead us to sing waterfall-related songs throughout the ride.
 
Damn it. My Selfie alert system didn't work. Back to the drawing board.

Any coders on here know where I am going wrong with this?


Public float ponceLevel = 20.0f;
Public bool imagePosted;

void RampantNarcissism ()
{
if (imagePosted = true, ponceLevel >= 50.0f)
{
SelfieAlert();
}

void SelfieAlert()
{
SendAlert("@jdd", "They are at it again! Go and sort them out");
SignalAlert("pink", Saturation=0, Bokeh=1000, Smile=false, Cringe=1000);
}
 
The waterfall thing is me have this undying urge to take a selfie near, under, on the side of a waterfall with the bike in hand... that lead us to sing waterfall-related songs throughout the ride.
Ah yes - one can cause significant cycle-ogical damage to a riding partner by singing the same song all day. In future I suggest that you just stick to the rivers and the lakes that you're used to. ;)
 
Looks like lots of fun but….. Very selfie of you to go riding like this while I am sick. Especially on a ride I have been wanting to do for a ling time, still thanks for making the tracks, now I will have a GPS to download!
 
@GrantT those moving pictures are what people call "movies". I put them on a website called "The Yewtube". It was the brainchild of two mother sheep who thought it would be a good idea to put moving pictures of their little lambs playing in the springtime so they had a memory of them, before they were carted off to some abattoir. It has since caught on around the world, with no only sheep, but humans, too.

@Half-Fast Mike thanks for the Toge name. I knew it must have one but couldn't find it on google maps. Have you done the climb?

@TCC how dare you set in place a selfie avoidance system . I feel violated.

@theBlob Well it's your fault for being an Aussie wuss ;)
 
I can see what I did wrong now; I only used a Floating Point number for the 'ponceLevel' variable. As we all know, the largest Floating Point number available in modern 64bit computing is 2.23×10−308.

This is obviously way too small to handle what you were feeding into it with your work.
 
@Half-Fast Mike thanks for the Toge name. I knew it must have one but couldn't find it on google maps. Have you done the climb?
I've been up to the top once. It was August. Sweat was literally overflowing from my shoes. Another time I rode up as far as the lake (which is quite new, BTW) and then turned west along the Crystal Line bound for Kiyosato. That was less horrendous and breathtakingly scenic.
 
Damn it. My Selfie alert system didn't work. Back to the drawing board.

Any coders on here know where I am going wrong with this?


Public float ponceLevel = 20.0f;
Public bool imagePosted;

void RampantNarcissism ()
{
if (imagePosted = true, ponceLevel >= 50.0f)
{
SelfieAlert();
}

void SelfieAlert()
{
SendAlert("@jdd", "They are at it again! Go and sort them out");
SignalAlert("pink", Saturation=0, Bokeh=1000, Smile=false, Cringe=1000);
}

I'm honored that you'd write code for me, but hey, those sweet whisperings won't get you anywhere near me.
 
Superb climb, can't wait to barrel down the dirt side on the CX bike one day.
There is a mountain hut serving great noodles 30 meters from the top. And of course the entry to the world of crystal line 2/3 up. Great riding.
 
PROPOSAL: Why not start calling the third-person-selfie a 'proxie'?;)

How `bout an `un-selfie`...or more simply, just a `photo`?

I`m sure we`re all dying to know the list of songs mentioned previously. Especially the really `ta{c}ki` ones...
 
How `bout an `un-selfie`...or more simply, just a `photo`?
Ridiculous suggestion, bracketed as it is in grave accents. We're sending a charity donation of proper apostrophes to the wilderness for you.
I`m sure we`re all dying to know the list of songs mentioned previously. Especially the really `ta{c}ki` ones...







(might not work embedded)

Possibly four more waterfall-related songs than the gruesome twosome knew already.
 
Odarumi is a great climb! And getting there via Yanagisawa and then up is a monster ride ... did this once back in 2009 ... except we started at 4AM to get out of town before the summer heat. And took the Yakeyama route on the lower half of the Odarumi climb.

http://positivo-espresso.blogspot.jp/2009/06/jumbo-mountain-training.html

And once started with Odarumi from Enzan and went onward via the Green Line and over Shinshu Pass and down to Sakudaira for the return train ... lots of nice options there.
http://positivo-espresso.blogspot.jp/2011/06/monster-ride.html

For a really long climb, almost 2000 meters elevation gain and more than 2000 meters cumulative climbing with the dip in the middle), it is a lot closer to Tokyo than Norikura or Shibu Toge. And it should be accessible earlier in the spring than those.
 
Back
Top Bottom