For people who love cycling like me, everywhere I travel always involve bicycles. Whether at my homes in Canada or Thailand, I will take an opportunity to do some cycle touring, and when I know that I’m going to Tokyo, bicycle is the first thing I think of. But bicycling in a big city like Tokyo?
It might be a nightmare like riding in Bangkok. Then I read one article on the internet, ‘The 20 Most Bike-Friendly Cities in the World’ and Tokyo is one of them. I was jumping with joy, and the plan to take Tokyo by bike has born. My plan combines bike and train. Trains in Japan will let you take your bike onboard, but it has to be a folding bike in a bike bag. Normal sizes are allowed in the train, but you have to take it all apart, both wheels off, and bag or box it.
I have two folding bikes, one in Canada and the other in Thailand. After touring in several places, short distance tours in Thailand and Canada or long tours in England and France, I can say that folding bike works as good as a normal size bike and a folding bike come with a bonus. It’s so convenient for moving it around.
Traveling to Japan this time, I will not take my bike with me. Instead I will get a new one in Tokyo. I have one in particular in my heart, a tiny little folding bike that I had seen on the net. I went on searching the net for bicycle shops in Tokyo, and came across the 'Cycle House Shibuya' web site. The site is in Japanese and just the picture of the bikes in the site made me jump with joy, because one of them is the bike in my heart. So the first place I went when I got to Tokyo is the 'Cycle House Shibuya'.
Cycle House Shibuya shop is not hard to find. The shop is full of all kind of bikes and the shop specialize in folding bikes. They carry several brands of folding bike like BROMPTON, DAHON, STRIDA and the bike in my heart 'Pacific Carry Me'. They also have some bicycle related goods from helmets to bike bags and so on. The staffs here speak very little English but that is not a problem at all. They are all friendly and helpful.
Cycle House Shibuya sits not far from Futakotamagawa Station on Tokyu Den-en-toshi Line, and five stations from Shibuya station. You can check out their web site here. The shop is open from 10.00 -19.00, every day except Tuesday and Wednesday.
