Nara · Spring 2027 · Several routes in design
Nara is where Japan began. We are designing several ways into it rather than one — the first departures come in spring 2027, and until then there is the waitlist.
01 — Why Nara
Kyoto is where Japanese culture was perfected. Nara is where it began.
Japan's oldest Buddhist image. Among its oldest shrines. A road still walked sixteen centuries after it was first worn into the ground. Nara holds more "oldest" in one small basin than anywhere else in the country.
Kyoto became the capital in 794. Nara was the capital before that, in 710. To ride from one to the other is to travel backward through Japanese history — one river, one gate, one temple bell at a time.
We don't drive past this history. We ride into it, by body.
02 — The Routes
Nara is not one road. We are drawing four, riding each of them this winter, and keeping the ones that hold.
South out of Kyoto on the Kizu river path, across a wooden bridge built to wash away in a flood, and down into the Nara basin. One line of sutra copied by hand at a temple in Nishinokyo, then a dusk arrival and dinner in Nara. The same idea as our flagship — the crossing itself is the experience.
The gates of Todai-ji open at first light, before the visitors come, and a priest walks you into the inner sanctuary at Kasuga Taisha. Then out along the Suzaku boulevard of the capital that ruled Japan in 710 — grass now, where a city was — to Nishinokyo for shakyo, and on to Horyu-ji. Onsen, dinner, and the awards at the end.
Japan's oldest road, worn into the foot of the mountains before the country had a capital, and the burial mounds of Asuka beyond it. Parts of it cannot be ridden at all, so a walking stretch is built into the day. Autumn only, on e-bikes, designed as a second day for guests who already know Nara.
The treasure hall at Kofuku-ji opens for us before it opens to the public, and the Ashura stands in an empty room. That hour exists only for those who sleep in Nara — so this version does. A full day, a night here, and a morning ride before the second day begins.
Fares are announced with the spring 2027 calendar. Routes are confirmed after field testing this winter.
03 — Three Ways In
Flat and paved for most of its length, the Nara basin lets us ride into history without leaving the saddle.
A brush, black ink, one line of sutra copied by hand — the closest thing to standing still that a cycling day allows.
Miwa somen, a noodle twelve centuries old. Shojin cooking. Sake, first brewed here before anywhere else in Japan.
04 — Waitlist
Waitlist members hear first when the routes are confirmed, and receive first access to the 2027 departures.
More Journeys
