Eating like kings

Behind these intriguing hanging drapes awaits a meal like no other. It's often hard to tell where to eat, what they're serving, or how much it costs, but with the help of Google Translate, some smiles, and occasionally an English menu, we've been able to try some incredible Japanese dishes without breaking the bank, nor speaking much Japanese. At the particular restaurant shown above, we had some tasty soba noodles that happened to be featured on a Micheline Star review guide back in 2019.

We stumbled across this restaurant while strolling through Takayama, where we landed for our rest day today. We've found that a lot of the ones suggested on Instagram, TikTok, or online tend to be incredibly busy, leading to long wait times and occasionally overpriced menus. The best part about Japan is that you can find amazing food just about everywhere. Cooks here are extremely passionate, and the level of detail is consistently shown in every dish we've been served. Each meal is presented with pride, precision, and politeness.

Both Jared and I love to eat good food. We've been mixing it up - trying new Japanese cuisine at various restaurants, konbini, and occasionally grocery stores, while also making lots of “homecooked” meals on our MSR multifuel stove.

Some of our camp meals have included spring rolls with miso soup, spaghetti with meatballs, egg burritos, tortilla pizzas (a McFerrin family classic), and some incredible sandwiches. The best part about traveling by bike is that we don't have to pay for gas. Our gas is our food, and our motors are our muscles. The more we ride, the more we get to eat.

To show you some of what we've enjoyed, I've now uploaded quite a few of our recent eats to the Itadakimasu photography page. Sometimes, however, we've been too hungry to stop and take a photo. On top of cycling for 4–5 hours a day, the mountains have added a good challenge, leading to an increased appetite. We stop every hour or so to take a break, drink water, and of course, have a bite to eat.

We are eating like kings.

Bike trip–wise, we’ve now taken our first official rest day after seven days of riding and will be back on the saddles tomorrow. We've covered just over 400 km and have about 1,200 km left, meaning the majority of the adventure still lies ahead. We're deep in the mountains and loving the views along the much quieter roads compared to the coast.

Today we gave our bikes a good check-in and cleaning to ensure everything’s running smoothly. We had a minor issue with Jared's rear cassette, derailleur, and jockey wheels the other day, but thankfully I was able to sort it out after a couple of hours. Both bikes are now rolling smoothly, and we should be good to keep moving forward tomorrow.