Hello! Welcome to Travels with Chari.

Thanks for stopping by!

This adventure is the love child of Danny Olsson and his bicycle, Chari. Chari is not a particularly inventive name for a bicycle in Japan as, in Japanese, it literally means bicycle. The name came about when, one sunny day, possibly a Sunday or another day, Danny was lying on his futon reading a book. It was not the first time Danny had read a book but something in the book – a hidden meaning, a subtle flavour – inspired him. It is hard to say what it was about this particular book – if you know the book and notice something that Danny did not please drop him a line – but something in the pages gnawed gently at Danny’s superior cortex until suddenly, on that sun-basked futon Travels with Chari was born. The book in question was John Steinbeck’s Travels with Charley: a rambunctious tale of one man and his dog and a soul exploring journey across the United States. On the face of it the two adventures have very little in common: Travels with Charley has a man, a dog and the United States while Travels with Chari has a man, a bicycle and Japan. Seemingly the only thing in common is that there is a man in both stories – but many books have men.

Travels with Chari is about Japan. It’s about a man (me – Danny Olsson). It’s about cycling – but not in the I-bought-these-new-pedals-and-they’re-amazing way, more like the my-bum-is-still-sore-but-I-spoke-to-this-guy-today-who-made-me-think-twice-about-something sort of way. There will be photographs and tales from the road. There will be emotional whimperings about being lonely and there will be insuppressible moments of pride and self-gratification (for which I offer no apology).

Travels with Chari is a story. It will have a beginning, a middle and an end. I hope you stay with me and I hope I entertain you and show you a few things you never knew about.

Japan is a wonderful country with wonderfully generous people but the idea of cycling from one end to the other all by myself terrifies me. Any words of encouragement you might offer or even just being able to see my website stats that tell me you’ve visited will keep my pedals turning and my mind sane (or at least maintained at its current level of sanity).

I hope you stop by again soon.

Cheers,

Danny