5/5: The last official day of our tour through the land of the rising sun. Some of us are staying a few days later. So before we rode our bikes to the port for loading, our wonderful guide Yuki-San took us to the Japan Railway (JR) station so we could obtain bullet train tickets to various other parts of Japan. The mass transportation system here is amazing. Between subway, busses and trains you can get anywhere and quickly. Seattle could really learn some things from this country.

Our ride to the port was uneventful as Mike had the foresight to hire a cab to guide us instead of relying on our collective ability to hit the right off-ramp in Yokohama. We were a sight. 13 large displacement motorcycles taking up formation down the expressway led by a small taxi with white gloved driver. The really neat surprise upon our arrival at the container facility was that they would wrap our panniers and load our bikes! The process can take up to half a day so we were a happy group.

Our farewell dinner was, as all are, bittersweet. This trip was short and I did not really get to know some of the other riders as well as I would have liked. However, my experience riding the roads of Japan on this GlobeRiders tour was genuinely special as I was able to renew old friendships, make some new acquaintances and see some incredible countryside while tasting, smelling hearing and feeling the unique cultural nature of this island nation. I certainly wish to come back and explore more...........

By the way, Mr. Townsley you actually did a GREAT job in setting up our waypoints. Thanks Dan!

Hiroshima 5/6: Four of us took a bullet train to Hiroshima the day after our tour ended. For me, it was a sobering experience. Being at the place where the first Atomic Bomb was exploded at 8:15 August 6, 1945 felt eerie.

A number of monuments are located centrally in Hiroshima at the Peace Memorial Park, one of which is called "A-Bomb Dome" (genbakudome-mae). One of the few structures that survived the bombing and subsequent fire, it is a haunting skeletal reminder of the damage that was done. I felt at times awkward as an obvious outsider when walking through their museum, which detailed the destruction to people, buildings and property and where tears and tissue were not uncommon.

I now can relate to Japanese visitors at the Pearl Harbor Memorial who were looked at "sideways" by some other visitors as if to question why they would want to visit such a place. The hope that the people of Hiroshima have is that we'll all destroy our nuclear weapons so that the horrors experienced in their city and Nagasaki will never be repeated. Should be the hope of all of us.  

Greetings Frank Leonard

5/5:Hello Everybody, What a wonderful time we have had thus far. From the first day riding our bikes in the dark to our Tokyo hotel to the overnight Ferry ride and rush hour traffic back to Tokyo hotel. (the hotel is heaven). Japan is a wonderful, peaceful and clean place. Many beautiful motorcycle roads and excellent scenery. Honshu to Hokkaido....wind, rain and sunny days.

The group is great. We hate to say goodbye to most of them as we will ride at 8:00 a.m. tomorrow for Kobe.. From Kobe we will board a Chinese ferry to meet 4 more riders in Bejing. There will be 7 of us on the ferry and it takes about 3 days. We will have our own sleeping quarters while everyone else will sleep on mats in the aisles.

The trip was very busy and allowed little time for correspondence. I will attempt to download some pics for you to enjoy.

Konnichi wa for now,

Debbie and Harrison

P.S. The food is excellent and we have developed a liking for sashimi!

5/5: Hi Helge and followers of Globeriders adventures: This morning part of the group left to begin their World Tour adventure. It was hard to see them go knowing that they are about to begin a great ride through China and across Russia to Germany. We wish that we could go with them.

The last two weeks have been packed with sights to see and roads to travel. We have visited temples and stayed at minka's, which are residences constructed in traditional Japanese building style. We have traveled on bullet trains and viewed rock formations along the coast by boat. The weather has also been varried. From rain to almost snow, from overcast to sunny, I think we have seen it all. You can tell from the fields that spring has arrived as the farmers are just getting their fields ready to plant. As the days pass we see more activity in the fields as the farmers plant this years crops.

On the northern island we travel up the western coast and see the interesting ways that the locals keep the sea from claiming their land. At the most northern point we have to navigate strong cross winds which make keeping the motorcycle in the proper lane challenging. On an early morning outing to see Japanese Crane's, we also see many deer, a fox, and a blue heron. The people in Japan are the most gracious we have ever encountered. They are always smiling and seem genuinely happy to see you.

The one item that we will all miss on retuning home will be the heated toilet seats which all hotels have had as well as many of the gas stations along the road. Today is be our last day in Japan and we will spending it exploring the city around our hotel.

Thank you Helge, Mike, Dan and especially Yuki for making this such an interesting journey.

Ann and Jeff Roberg

5/6: Hi Family & Friends Well the Globeriders tour of Japan has ended. We dropped off our motorcycles yesterday in Yokohama. Seven of the riders have continued on to China, Russia and Europe. They will be met in China with several other riders. I saw them off this morning and part of me wished I was going.

The Japan tour was everything I hoped it would be. We stayed in a variety of accommodations - 5 star hotels, a biker inn (6 on bunks) and old style inn (slept on a futon) and overnight on a ferry. All were enjoyable and fun. The food is delicious with donburi, sushi and ramen as my favorites. I feel like I gained weight because Mike and Aillene Paull stopped at local restaurants for lunch and the portions were large and mighty tasty. This added to buffet breakfasts and gourmet dinners.

Traffic in the cities was congested and on-ramps to the toll roads were hard to find. Even with the GPS and routing it was difficult. Once we were out in the country we had a blast. The mountain roads gave us curves, hairpins and beautiful scenery. Only one person got a speeding ticket and probably all of us deserved some. It was very hard to go only 80 KMH instead of 80MPH. The riders all got along and helped each other. It seems on the 4 Globeriders tours I have been on this is one thing you can count on - great people.

Mike an outstanding job as tour leader. I would not hesitate to join any tour that he leads. Dan did an outstanding job routing the GPS and keeping us from getting lost. Yuki-san made all the arrangements and was our Japan guide did the most outstanding job of giving us the true Japan. Visiting Temples, fishing villages, samurai houses and Tokyo night life it gave me an everlasting impression of Japan.

Other tidbits -gas was five to six dollars a gallon, a liter of oil was twenty-six dollars and toll roads cost from six to thirty-one dollars depending on the distance. Japan is expensive but for me it was well worth the cost. I am off on my own for the next week to travel through Japan on the bullet train. I bought a train pass and will travel to Takayama, Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Hope you are all doing well and miss you.

Love David

5/6:Hello, We have just arrived at the hotel in Tokyo and have dropped our bikes off at the freight agent in Yokohama. What a great ride. We started with a Minka about 300 km from Tokyo. It was a little hassle getting out of Tokyo due to not being able to find the right entrance to the right tollway. We finally hired a taxi and it got us started on the right route. It was raining and that did not help with the navigation.

The last time I saw Henry he was riding south on the wrong tollway. He arrived at the Minka around 10 that night after seeing most of Tokyo and all the Tollways. We then rode a very scenic mountain route of the Bandai-san Gold Line, Bandai Azuma Lake Line and Bandai Azuma Skyline. What a great motorcycle ride. It was a little rainy but not too bad. We got to our hotel and took a boat ride through the islands of Matsushima Bay. On to Morioka and there we took a Bullet Train to Kakunodate Station to see the samurai warrior homes and the cherry blossom festival. We were a week late for the Cherry blossom blooming but it was a very interesting city.

The next day we went on to Aomori and took the high speed ferry to Hokkaido and then rode to Sapporo. It was a beautiful ride along the west coast. We are now getting used to navigating around Japan and I don’t think anyone got lost. We went to a biker house in the north of the island and it was great fun. The snoring wasn’t too bad and the owners took very good care of us. Today we crossed the 45th Parallel and the next day we rode to the most northern point of Japan, Cape Soya and took a group picture.

The riding in this area of Hokkaido was some of the best motorcycle riding ever. It was a beautiful ride with lots of twistys. We stayed at a very nice hotel near the Kushiro Marsh where we saw the Tancho( Japanese Crane). The ferry ride back to Tokyo was uneventful and we found our way back to the super hotel in Tokyo with out much trouble. All together it was a great trip. The group got along well together and we all learned a lot about the Japanese culture. I can’t wait to take another GlobeRiders Tour of Indo China next year. I am jealous of the group that are going on to the World Tour after we leave them in Japan to go home.

Roger Hansen