Hey guys!
In the spring I went to Japan and attempted to bike across the country writing posts as I traveled. I started in Kagoshima, the southern most tip of Japan and biked north to Aomori. I wasn’t able to finish the entire trip in one go, but I was able to get halfway across reaching Nagoya. I struggled to continue due to an injury I received. I’m currently in Physical therapy, i’m getting better and should be able to finish in April 2024! I have gotten a lot of DMs asking questions so I decided to make a post answering some of the most common ones.
**What kind of bike did you use?**
I went with a traditional Mamachari, which literally means “mother bicycle” in Japanese. A common Japanese city bicycle that allows mothers to travel with their children in the back. I can keep my cargo in the rear basket and my camera in the front so I can film without a problem. Since I was trying to make videos for this series I was following the 10 second rule. This means that you need to be able to record within 10 seconds or else you would miss the shot. I liked it since it’s designed to be more comfortable and was easy to ride since I’m sitting upright. I bought the biggest mamachari they had with gears since I’m a big guy (6 feet and 230lb) with cargo.
I could go with a road bike which would have allowed me to go further, but the problem was that I couldn’t add a basket which I needed to film and to charge my phone as I rode. I also was worried that bending over for several hours would get exhausting long term. There were some options to carry cargo, but I thought it would over complicate things. A mountain bike was an option, but most of my rides were on the road so it was inefficient to have thick rough tires. Another big reason I went with a common city bike is that if I needed a part or repairs a city bike is pretty common so it’s not hard to find a shop that could help. My bike was one of the most common ones in Japan. If I brought a nice expensive bike from the US I don’t know if I can get help.
Something else I needed to think about was that If bike breaks beyond repair or if the bike gets stolen. I would only lose a few hundred dollars at the end of the day. I really wanted that freedom since I’m alone in a foreign country so I needed to Flexible. I bought a high end Mamachari and had the 2 baskets installed for about 60,000 yen (\~$410).
**How much training did I have?**
Not a lot. Before going on this trip I was in the Philippines and Malaysia so I didn’t have the ability to train as much as I wanted. I bought day passes at local gyms and did as many leg exercises as I could. I wanted to shock my legs and prepare my lungs. I focused on this for about 3 weeks before I got to Japan. I started my trip with about 20 km a day and slowly built up how far I went. The first 2 weeks were rough since my body was getting used to everything so I threw in extra rest days and limited myself. I gradually got to 50 km daily within about a month.
If you want to do a long bike trip like this I would recommend biking as much as you can and to push your body’s limits while you’re in a safe environment. Once you can do 30km a day start to throw extra weight on your bike. I don’t think it’s too big of a deal if you’re not in perfect shape, this would just limit how much you can bike at the start and how far you will get through the trip in total. Make sure to take rest days and slowly increase it as time goes on. Your body and mind will adapt throughout the trip. Although if you have the chance please train and condition yourself. You’ll get more out of the trip and you will thank yourself.
**How much weight did you lose?**
I lost about 12 lbs through the 3 month bike ride, which is good but not as much as I wanted. You burn a lot of calories biking for such long periods of time. I estimated that I was burning about 3000 calories everyday just from biking. The problem with burning that many calories is that you start to feel extreme hunger and if you decide to limit your calories your body will start to feel sick. When I limited my calories I started to feel nauseous, light headed, had a hard time focusing and i didn’t have strength to keep pushing. So if you decide to restrict yourself too much your body will start to rebel against you. Every time I stopped by a convenience store I tried to get some protein, drinks and snacks to keep me going. I think I lost more weight than what the scale says since I noticed my body is a lot more toned. My leg muscles became massive by the end of it. I’m going to keep training so hopefully I’ll be in better shape when I return to Japan. Be patient with yourself if you want to do this for weight loss, most great things in life take time.
**Most important items to bring with you?**
A very good question. What you carry is going to be different based on how long the trip is, what your goals are and how much support you have. There are some fundamental items that can really make a big difference.
1: Japanese language for google translate. It’s so useful to communicate with people, I started the bike ride only knowing a few words of Japanese haha. This was so helpful when I needed to talk to people. If you download a language you can use the app offline.
2: Emergency sleeping bag: The biggest danger you have is not from a serial killer running around, but from the elements. An emergency blanket is super small, the size of a coke can and it is very thin. It does a great job of keeping you warm and dry in an emergency situation. I didn’t use it during this trip, but I did when I was hitch hiking on a train across the Sahara. The Sahara can get freezing at night and this really helped me stay warm. It’ll keep you safe until day break.
3: 10,000 mAh Powerbank: A Portable charger is essential since you need your phone for navigation and translation. Each power bank usually has enough electricity to charge your phone twice. I also had a reserve power bank for emergencies so I could charge my phone 4 times over.
4: Emergency cash: This is very important since you can solve most of your problems with cash if you get into a pickle. If you’re lost and need a ride you can hire anyone if you have the budget to get you somewhere. It’s also important in case you lose your wallet that you have funds to keep you going until you can get help. Make sure to keep this in a unique area so it doesn’t get lost with your bag. I kept cash in the breast pocket of one of my jackets. Some cash in the sole of your shoe is a great idea since you’ll always have them on you at all times, why would you lose shoes? Writing credit card info is also a good idea.
5: Backup phone: if you’re going for a long trip it’s also not a bad idea to have a backup phone. You can get an old used smartphone for $100, you just need something basic that use an e-sim (Make sure it can use an E-Sim). You don’t need to buy an extensive service plan. I would get an e-sim app on the phone like Ubigi so you can buy data. In Japan I bought 10 GB for less than $20. If your main phone breaks or gets lost you can use this to get around, book a place to stay and translate.
6: Mosquito repellent is also great, a small bottle was fine for me. There are a lot of options for this, just have something to deal with insects.
**How much did the bike ride cost?**
Before I go over the budget, it’s important to remember that how comfortable you want to be is tied to how much a trip like this would cost. The more flexible you can be the cheaper this can be. I flew into Kagoshima, which is the southernmost city in Japan, from the Philippines for $300. My flight back to the US was $330. I got a good deal. My bicycle with the baskets and helmet were about $450 . My tent and sleeping bag were about $90.
Accommodations weren’t too bad.
1: There are campsites in the countryside that cost about $5
2: Guest houses are a great option, it’s similar to a hostel and they cost about $25
3: Because there are so many people traveling for business, there are many basic budget hotels around $35 a night.
I met some people who were biking for smaller distances and only used the camping option so It was very cheap for them. I used all 3 options, but I mainly stayed in hotels because If I wasn’t biking or trying a new experience I would be editing videos. I usually spent about 30-40 hours working on each episode of the series. The hotels were great since most of them had a desk to work on, great to recharge and it was easy to charge my equipment. Sightseeing was cheap since most of the things I wanted to see were free anyway. There were a few museums and castles I had to buy tickets for. At most it must have been 100 dollars for everything.
For Food most hotels have free breakfast, you can get miso soup, rice and grilled eel . I could get a decent meal for about 1000 yen at most restaurants. I grabbed snacks quite often to power me through at convenience stores. I would say I spent about 17 dollars a day on food.
There are some supplies that you should take with you we talked about earlier. An emergency blanket, Insect repellent, 2 portable chargers ect. I would say about $300 for supplies and other miscellaneous.
*The trip cost me about $5,300 for the 3 months*
**Conclusion**
Those were the most common questions I received. I had absolute blast doing this trip. I had so many amazing experiences and met so many great people. If you’re thinking about doing it, even for a small ride, please go. I learned so much about myself, got better at editing, became more confident and made memories that will last me lifetime. I will never forget the kindness of the Japanese people or the beauty of this country!
Please let me know if you have any other questions!