Korea + Japan 04/17 – Himeji Central Park

Day 5

Today began with my first ever trip on one of Japan’s legendary bullet trains and while it was everything I wanted it to be and more, it did cost over one hundred pounds each, ONE WAY, not the full way, so for the price it’s probably about what you’d expect.

We were on route to Osaka but were stopping off at Himeji for the park and to see the castle. Once we got to Himeji station we rented the last 3 large luggage lockers and now free of that burden we set off to explore.

First we took a bus from the station to Himeji castle and in stark constrast to Korea the bus drivers here are the friendliest people on Earth. We spent about half an hour seeing as much of the castle as you can for free before we caught another bus to the park.

Himeji Central Park

Himeji Central Park is home to an amusement park and a safari and you can’t buy tickets for just one, also if you want to ride the rides once you’ve paid to enter the amusement park, then that’s a further cost. I’ve easily paid worse for less but that didn’t make it sting any less.

It stings even more when the park itself feels very tired and forgotten, with some areas looking totally abandoned. A perfect example of this is when I went to the bathroom, the light didn’t work and there were spider webs everywhere. Another would be the park’s Ferris wheel which was covered in rust and felt like it was about to collapse.

Camelback Jetcoaster – The perfect time to think of how much this park just cost us.

Diavlo – B&M Batman clone that rode completely forceless and they wouldn’t let us ride anywhere but the front to give it a better chance.

Hurricane Screw & Loop Coaster – Togo looping coaster that was nothing special but it wasn’t rough.

Labryinth – Probably the best coaster in the park was Labryinth, a Meisho mini coaster that was alot more brutal than I was expecting but in a good way!

Freefall – My first experience of a first gen Intamin drop tower and I loved it. Scary, janky and hilarious in equal measure.

Giant Ferris Wheel – As mentioned before this Ferris wheel was in a digusting state and I was quite honestly worried for our safety.

All said and done I walked away from Himeji Central Park pretty disappointed. The park really does look a state, the star attraction (Diavlo) rode badly and we paid through the teeth to experience it. Space World was in such better upkeep than this place and that’s gone now, so what does that say really?

We needed to take a taxi back to Himeji station because the next bus to arrive at the park was 4 hours away and we had no reason to stay for that much longer. From the station we had 2 options, bullet train or scenic train to Osaka, we opted for the latter because we were making such good time.

After checking into our hotel we went out for shopping and food. I had been warned Osaka was rougher and ruder than other places in Japan but it still took me by suprise when the staff at some expensive pizza place treated us like scum, the polar opposite of how we were treated in Fukuoka.

Thanks for reading, click here for day 6, Universal Studios Japan!