Golden week: Fukushima and Yamagata

Golden week has been and gone. The unseasonably warm weather provided ideal conditions for biking. We left the expressway at Fukushima and travelled through the lesser travelled roads of Fukushima and Yamagata.

Mt Bandai, Fukushima

Ura Bandai

Lake Hibara which is apparently a mesotrophic lake, formed when Bandai san errupted
in the late 1800s.

Lake Hibara

We took the the road around the back of Bandai san  to Yonezawa, Route 2, via Lake Hibara.
The road is a bikers paradise, snaking its way up and around and down Tohachiyama

Bandai National Park

Still snow in the mountains

Lake Hibara

The Bandai area borders Yamagata prefecture, and we rode up towards the flat farmland of 

Yonezawa, and north along route 287 before rejoining the expressway that goes to Futasui.

A late blooming sakura at a michi no eki south of  Ohe machi.

Yamagata farmland. This would have been covered in snow when I was up there in March.