Cycling in Japan: 5 Essential Tips of Traveling with Your Bike!

How to dispose your huge bike box at the airport?

Hi there!!

I am Atsushi Mabuchi who is one of the most crazy cyclist in our local region.

Today, I will explain how to cycling in our country efficiently and comfortably.

At first, almost all people who want to cycle in Japan have struggled how to dispose the huge bike box.

As you know, this country well maintaind clean environment.
Therefore, there are few garbage box in the city and the airport that you arrive.

So, you must be in this place with huge bike box if you arrive.


Today, I will explain how to dispose efficiently from the public information such as international airport.

The case of Nagoya International Airport.

From the public information, if you can arrive at the airport and disassemble the bike, you can go to the information center with your bike box.

It must be empty box without any components and objects.

If so, you can dispose with the help with information center.

There are several information and help centers.


The link of Nagoya International Airport Information center
https://www.centrair.jp/service/information-center.html


For now, it’s free, but in the future, it might be paid.

The case of Narita(Tokyo) International Airport.

From the public information, if the bike box is empty, you can put the box by the garbage box.
Therefore, it’s still free for now.

But, in the future, it might be paid as well.


The important things is dispossing this huge box without any objects cleanly as much as you can.

If so, you can remove this huge box from your great cycling adventure from then.

How to take your bike on the train.(Rinko)

From the previous information, you can go everywhere anytime by train.

But, there are rules for this with your bike on the train.

If you go to other place, you must have a bike carry bag (Rinko bag) to get on the train.

There are three rules for this.

1.Fully covered.

You shoud covered your bike by the bike carry bag.

It must be covered complitely before you take a bus or a train.

We called the unique baggage system “Rinko”.

If you don’t cover the bike complitely, you might be stopped clerk of the station when you take the train.
But, it might be rare.

2.Specific bag.

And then, you should prepare this bag well in advance.

You are able to purchase this bag all around in Japan.

You can purchase this bag at the huge shopping center or the special sports bike shop.
In Japan, almost all persons always utilize a bike that has strange and unique looking shapes called “Mamachari”.

The strange bike has a increadible durability but, it’s heavy than you expected.
It might be over 20 kg to 25kg.

Isn’t it heavy?.

Shops that have such a bike mainly don’t have this carry bike bag.
Therefore, you should go to a bike shop of huge shopping center or sports bike shop to get the bag.

3.End of the train.

As you knos, our train always looks like traffic conjestion of south east asia.
There are few spaces, that’s why, you should go to the space of end of the train.

If you save those rules, we highly welcome your tours and great adventures.

3.Two stage side turn.

Almost all foregn persons said that we were scared the rules of the main roads.

If you take a main road, you should obey and understand the rules strictly to avoid catcing from a police.
I think that the rule is stupid, but it’s Japanese rule.
Our government makes stupid rule like everyday, but, it’s simmilar from your country’s government right?

The wide main road must not turn right according to a rule.

We have to go straight and we should turn right again and go straight .

Once we go straight the traffic signal, we have to turn right and go straight again.

That’s why, it might be a little bit complicated for you.
We applogize for the inconvenience for you from the stupid rules.

And then, we have a lot of mountains compared to your country.
So, we have a variety of dark and cold tunnels.
We are always scared this dark system compared to the horror movies despite a crazy cyclist.

If you can see the side walk in the dark one, you should take the side walk immediately like speed of the light.

I highly recommend it to keep your health and safe.


Never forget it!!

4.Steep slopes despite not having a short distance.

In Japan, there are a lot of steep slopes despite huge city.

Thats why, if you go to the place, you must not have heavy baggage to climb the steep slopes.

In contrast, we have a convenience carrying system “Yamato Transport”.

This company is able to carry your bag, laggage, and souvenior at in a few days.


You can find this carrying company among the Google maps easily.

Please serch the google maps with the word “Yamato” or “Yamato transport”.

That’s why, if you decide a hotel, you can reservation of this laggage of transportation with this company called “Yamato”.


If you have a question about this system, please consult the hotel persons about it.

5.Refeed by your self.

Perhapes, you are heading for rural towns and mountains to avoid traffic signals and traffic jams.

In order to avoid low blood sugar during hard cycling, you should know the informative information of refeed by yourself.

Basically, you can find convenience store all around except for rural towns.

If you will go to huge mountains and lines, you should prepare well in advance before going to the adventure of hard cycling.

You can dispose only what you purchased at this convenience store.

Except for the convenience stores, we have a variety of vending machines.

Almost all cyclist who live in rural towns know how is the vending machine important.

But unfortunately, those vending machines don’t accept the bill of 5,000 and 100,000.

Therefore, you should prepare 1,000 yen and many coins before attacking the huge mountains.

It’s the our insurance.

Those tips are equirally significant to go cycling without botthers and concerns.