The weather forecast promised us sunshine, what an absolute lie that was
500 million dollar weather satellite
and it can't even get the weather right, what a load of shit.
Good morning everyone, welcome back to the Abroad In Japan
journey across Japan... Lots of words with 'Japan' in it....
cycle across Japan. Good to see you, I'm sorry I haven't had a shower yet so my face is very
horrible and not good to look at, so sorry about that
Chris just went down into the hot spring, for his morning *chuckle* his morning
relaxation bath
turns out a special guest has arrived
I wonder who it could possibly be?
I don't believe it!
laugh *Yeah, morning!*
Good morning! What happened yesterday??
*I had a boiler, in salon...*
The boiler genuinely exploded *Yeah*
Oh no! How are your legs today?
You're wearing cycling! He's wearing cycling pants again
But today Natsuki is just here to wave us off but I'm glad
he came all the way here just to say goodbye, it's a nice gesture.
Every time I walk away from Natsuki and come back to him, he's wearing
...he's wearing something different, what's this?
*It's Yamagata idol....yeah*
Okay, so the food of Yamagata
basically is cherries so Natsuki has
*cherries!*
got some sort of cherry....helmet *ooohhhhhh*
It's too early in the morning for this. *It's safety!*
*cherry Chris!!*
What's...what....what are you???
*maniacal laughter* Ohhhh
Oh....
Oh... *nice helmet* Oh dear
*yes*
*laughs*
So apparently I've got to wear this all the way to Nigata
only thing is, I don't know if it fits over the helmet
so that might be a rather dangerous health hazard, I don't want to fall off the bike and then
not survive because I was wearing a stupid cherry hat.
Anyway look at this over here, it's time to introduce the thing
that's going to make this whole cycle all the more interesting
so this is Anpanman, he's a very famous Japanese cartoon character
and he is wearing the 'builders' cycle helmet from yesterday
it looks like a construction worker helmet. But this is a capsule toy machine
containing *twists dial on toy*
capsules
but there's no toys. Every single day of the trip what we're going to have in here
are challenges sent in by you guys
that I will undertake, maybe it's a food you want me to try,
a place you want me to go or a person you want me to meet -
whatever your challenge is you can write it down on the Tokyo Creative website, I've put a link
in the description box below, write it there
every single day of the trip, my team, who are travelling with me
will pick out five or six of the craziest, wackiest ones
put them in this machine, and then at the start of every single day
I'll pull out a challenge and undertake it, hopefully something good
and hopefully it's not something that involves a 'cherry hat'.
Whatever it is guys, send it in and hopefully it can be your toy
coming out of...er...coming out of Anpanman's
.......coming out of his crotch
What a visual, who thought that was a good idea??
How distasteful.
Is it actually fitting on? It's just coming off though.
He really, really wants me to wear this, this cherry
this cherry hat over my helmet, and to do that
he's started cutting it up
what? this is mental, f**cking hell *KILLING!*
Oh my god
*Natsuki struggles*
he's taking all the stress out from the exploded boiler
on the cherry hat, Natsuki by the end of this, there's going to be nothing left
this is mental
Natsuki have you got another challenge? I don't...I think this challenge is er...
has been shredded, quite literally *postcard!*
postcard? Now that's a challenge I can get behind
alright, and you can have that back *eh*
Thanks mate
*laughs*
Well Natsuki, it's been great to see you
and have you join us on this part of the journey
*take care* thanks Natsuki
*rings bell* Bye Natsuki!
*bye!* *Go Go Chris!......Go Chris*
Laughs
and away we go...again
50km to go
The stretch of the route we're going down today is very, very remote
I don't even think there's even any convenience stores
I feel a little bit emotional, saying goodbye to Natsuki
it feels like now the cycle, kind of
really begins.
*heavy rainfall*
It is absolutely tipping it down, thank God I found this little bus shelter
it's like fucking Noah's Ark out there, I would have been swept away in a flood
I do have a giant raincoat I could have pulled over myself, but this is the kind of
rain that hits the road and bounces straight back off, so
I thought I'd just wait it out, sit here and err...
just relax all by myself in the absolute
middle of nowhere.
If you're wondering where my team are? The three guys who are travelling with me
basically for the whole trip, they go 20-25km ahead of me
and we sort-of meet at 20km intervals
and they do that to check that
...that I'm not dead, so when I turn up and meet them
puffing, panting, exhausted
they can see that I'm still alive and they can kind of feel a sense of relief before they go ahead
to the next place. There are gonna be people
dropping in along the trip, along different parts of it
we do have a guy, who is coming two or three days later, in Niigata
he's a guy, he's a vlogger and er, he's quite well known
if you know your YouTubers you can probably guess who he is!
let's see if you can guess in the comments, but um, for now
I guess I'm going to have to wait this out a little longer and if it doesn't
stop then....I'm just going to have to put my coat on
and take my chances to be honest
something I'm not really looking forward to.
I must admit, as of now...
cycling in the rain might be one of my new least favourite things
it's going in my eyes and face
the water is just spraying off the tyres up my back
the weather forecast promised us sunshine, what an absolute lie that was
500 million dollar weather satellite and it can't
even get the weather right, what a load of shit
some of the worst rain I've encountered in years
cycling in the rain makes me wonder why I'm doing all this
when I could just be sitting at home, on my sofa, enjoying biscuits.....you know
So, we've done 31km now guys, we've got 22 left to go
If I was clever, the one sponsorship deal that I should have got
is this...this is energy jelly, you get it in
any convenience store across Japan
this is SUPER PROTEIN
it's not just protein it's 'super protein'.
Honestly though I may have been whinging earlier about the weather
I couldn't be happier right now, this is absolutely stunning
sitting here...
with the sea air blowing in my face, my
...banana yoghurt super protein jelly pack
This is it!...This is what cycling's all about, this is what I pictured
the whole thing being like really, so I'm really glad the dream has turned into reality
There were many reasons I wanted to go on this trip, like 'get fit'
'learn how to produce daily videos', which is something I've never done
and push myself in a way that I never have
you know, I never thought I'd be able to do 50km of cycling in a day
but above all it was just about, rediscovering travel
I...I started hating travelling places
I think it's because whenever I make a video I'm usually traveling there to make a video
Whereas in this case..
there is no plan and we're just going along to places
and filming things along the way, I mean, when we looked up this
region on a map, there is not a single thing on it
not a single attraction or thing there
and yet...we come across a place like this, you turn the corner
you go around the cliff and you come to somewhere like this
which is far more beautiful and profound
than most attractions that I've seen in Japan anyway, so
for me, this romantic cove with the sea air blowing in
and the super protein jelly in hand, this
personifies what the cycle is all about for me and why I decided to do it in the first place
I do feel like there's a bit of an 'us and them' mentality emerging
between my team and I
Look at them! In their cosy, comfortable 'automobile' with their
convenient seats and rainproof design!
b*stards
Although to be fair, despite the bad weather, I actually beat them here!
because they'd been sitting in the car all day on their macbook pros
plugged into the battery, they drained the car battery
and they needed somebody to come and stop and jumpstart their car so I actually beat them here, surprisingly
Yay, we made it Nigata...
...and the first thing we've got is roadworks, brilliant
*laughs*
I don't think they've got enough people working on that road
It's 5:15 and we're coming up
to Murakami station, I don't believe it
but I've actually done it
somehow!
I don't believe it
we did it, finally made it somewhere before sunset
because I didn't wear Natsuki's ridiculous cherry hat thing
I promised him that I would take him a photo, give him a postcard instead
so I've got to complete that challenge before I can truly relax
*exhales* Chris help me out here, I've got no idea
*what if you just...what about the station?*
Anpanman?
*oh yeah*
That'll do
*wow!*
*Arigato! Nice picture!*
My legs are, really a little bit achey, I'm going to give it a 6 out of 10
on the...'aching scale'
Though I do feel pretty pumped up, I dunno, even though it's about 1am at the moment
because I've been editing, I still feel kind of awake and alive
and energetic, and I think it must be something to do with endorphins
I dunno, I really need to look up what endorphins are
I always quote endorphins, everybody does
but I feel like...I haven't a clue what they are
so I should probably read about that
Tomorrow we reach Niigata city
and in Niigata I get a day off, we're gonna just explore the city and walk around
the day after tomorrow, so I can kind of relax a little bit
and hopefully my legs can recover.
That's all for now though guys, I'm about to roll over
and get some much needed sleep.
No matter where you might be out there in the big wide world, thanks for watching and hopefully...
...hopefully I'll see you tomorrow, have a good one.
I must admit, it's not every day a stranger pulls you over
at the side of the road to give you...
a PACKET OF CUSTARD CREAM BISCUITS!