Today was the day I’d literally had dreams about, the day we seek revenge on Nagashima Spa Land.
For those who haven’t read my report from 2017, the last time we visited it rained an hour in and they closed almost everything for the rest of the day, even though the sun came back. Rain wasn’t going to be an issue today thankfully, although the sudden immense heat that descended on Japan made for other issues.
Learning from our past mistake of arriving late and Steel Dragon having a 90 minute queue instantly, this time we arrived slightly before park opening.
While Heartline got our tickets I marvelled at one of the best theme park investments in years, Nagashima Spa Land now has large electronic information screens telling you what’s open in Japanese AND English. Previously you had to contend with 2 different hand drawn signs, contradicting each other and only in Japanese, which is about as helpful as it sounds.
Steel Dragon 2000 – Once in we powered straight to Steel Dragon and entered a 30 minute queue, it was about now that it became apparent just how hot it was going to be today as I found myself sweating from places I won’t discuss. Looking around the queue and seeing that even the Japanese were dying led me to believe it wasn’t just me being weak, this time at least.
After the usual Japanese faff of nothing in pockets, this time featuring a metal detector, we took our seats on this legendary coaster and what great seats they were.
Steel Dragon has trains designed by B&M, which amounts to the coaster pretty much using 2 wide B&M Hyper trains and they are awesome.
After the ride staff finish an amazing chant which ends with “Steela Dragon!” you are off up the unnervingly tall lift hill, sadly the following drop doesn’t amount to much though.
With this being my first giga coaster I foolishly expected the drop to be quite special but it really isn’t. The shaping of the drop and the fact it pulls out 100 feet from the ground means Steel Dragon’s drop delivers an experience that goes on forever but is completely forceless.
Following the disappointing first drop is 2 camel back hills which do absolutely nothing and then 2 huge inclined loops which only exist to kill speed.
Thankfully things pick up on the return to the station though, with several air time hills in a row, with at least half of them providing some decent pops of ejector. 2 of these hills are inside tunnels which makes for some good headchopper moments and in the heat made for some interesting extremes of temperature.
While I’m very satisfied to be able to say I’ve experienced Steel Dragon, I can’t help but feel a little disappointed.
Acrobat – From the moment Flying Dinosaur showed me that B&M flyers can be so much more than lumbering gimmick coasters I was desperate to try another and Acrobat didn’t disappoint.
This beast of a coaster packs so much intensity into it’s perfectly paced layout, it really is hard to point out a favourite part of the coaster when everything just flows so well.
With the important stuff that we missed from last time knocked off, we spent the next couple of hours mopping up all the filler stuff that litters Nagashima.
Bobkart – We started with the park’s Bobkart, I love these things and this one was no exception.
Looping Star – Blame it on the heat stroke or the concussion at the hands of the drop tower but I really wasn’t a fan of my first Looping Star. I’ve seen these things talked up all around the internet and I can’t understand why at all. Not as good as Nessie and I can’t remember Nessie is my review.
After this we went back to Steel Dragon, which broke down 5 minutes after we entered the queue, having not gained anything we tried to leave but a staff member told us to wait and we’d get a priority pass for when it reopens, can’t say no to that.
Next we went for a second lap of Acrobat and I fell even more in love with it.
By the time Steel Dragon reopened it was dusk and this made for a lovely backdrop to our second lap.
Arashi – Now you may notice that I’ve yet to mention Arashi…
When I first rode Arashi last year I really didn’t enjoy the experience it offered and vowed that it would take a lot to make me go on it again. Well I whole heatedly retract all previous statements about this wonderful ride.
While walking past, after having ignored it all day, I on the spur of the moment decided that I NEEDED to give it one more go to be sure.
Once seated however I couldn’t have been regretting my decision more, as the seating position jogged my previous traumatic experience.
Without a shadow of a doubt going up the lifthill was the most scared I’ve been in years, with palms sweating so much they were sliding on the restraint and my heart thumping harder in my chest than when I met the girl of my dreams on Valentine’s Day 2018.
Then it began and I wish I could do it justice.
Spinning so fast, so many times, I lost count and even though I try not to swear in Japan I found myself painting the almost night sky with every profanity under the sun. Intensity like I’ve never seen before and will likely never see again, in a hobby that features so much of the same sensation this thing takes you completely out of your comfort zone and then keeps going.
I can totally understand why I hated this thing last time but now that I’ve grown some balls Arashi is beautiful.
Riding Arashi twice in one day caused Heartline to spend 20 minutes in the bathroom sorting his life out and wanting to leave the park, thankfully I managed to convince him to join me in riding Acrobat one last time. At night I fell even further in love with it and I couldn’t think of a better way to end the day.
In the gift shop I bought an Arashi shirt as a peace offering to the beast for moaning about it last time.
Nagashima Spa Land has gone from a park I mocked and despised to a park I’m ashamed to say I’ve grown slightly fond of. When running, the sheer amount of rides surrounding you at all times is quite the sight and at night the place looks fantastic. Acrobat and Arashi are incredible coasters and Steel Dragon isn’t without it’s charm and things will only improve further when the park opens it’s RMC conversion of White Cyclone.
Thanks for reading, click here for day 6 where we visit 3 parks in 1 day.
Today began with an early start, followed by a trip on the metro to Busan airport.
After a rather uneventful hour long flight we were in Nagoya.
Despite it being my second time visiting Japan it managed to yet again take me by surprise just how friendly the people are.
Look slightly confused for half a second and out of nowhere a friendly Japanese man/woman will appear with a huge smile on their face desperate to help you.
After picking up the hire car and 2 comedy sized drinks from one of the millions of vending machines that litter Japan, it was off to Suzuka Circuit.
As you’ll hopefully remember from my last Japan report, Japanese highways come with very expensive tolls attached to them, it’s not at all uncommon for an hours journey to cost you £30 ONE WAY.
In order to slightly combat this, this time around we rented an ETC card. This card goes into a machine in the hire car and then allows you to drive straight through tolls, with the toll fee being charged to the card. The main advantage of this is that you save 1/3 on every toll and with the amount of driving we planned to be doing this was an absolute necessity.
On route we unintentionally passed Legoland Japan and I promise you I’m not joking when I say that the park is built in the middle of industrial wasteland to the side of a huge bridge. Seeing the stupid sky tower thing painted in the brash Lego colouring surrounded by rusting metal and chimneys was hilarious!
For the first 2/3 of the journey the weather was beautiful but as we approached the park, the heavens opened…
Suzuka Circuit
As well as being a World famous race course, Suzuka Circuit is also home to a sizable amusement park.
It was still raining somewhat heavily when we got to the ticket window and with this being Japan I was already expecting this to go terribly but to our surprise and delight it didn’t. Not only is every ride still running but we’d also be getting tourist discount!
After passing the turnstiles, the rain went from “oh this is quite heavy” to a “oh my god we are going to die” thunderstorm and immediately an announcement came over the park wide PA, well that’s gone well…
We powered straight to the first coaster assuming the worst but hoping if we were really quick we might be in luck.
Rocky Coaster – With lightning striking structures in the distance we entered the queue for Rocky Coaster, the park’s Senyo sit down coaster.
Coming from a man who’s ridden Stealth in hailstones, I was amazed any park in the World would run a coaster in this amount of rain, it’s not an exaggeration to say the rain was so heavy you couldn’t see through it. Couple that with lightning striking in the area and thunder shaking the ground and I was left in complete disbelief. Nagashima closed their entire park in moderate rain which ended after 2 hours and now Suzuka are running their coasters in a stupidly intense thunderstorm, someone needs to explain what’s going on over here!
After seeing 2 trains worth of people coming back wetter than Valhalla and in serious pain, I was glad the rain eased slightly for our lap, which I honestly cant’ remember at all because I was still in complete shock at what was happening.
Adventure Drive – We knew our luck was going to run out at some point, so we powered to the park’s only other coaster as soon as we got off Rocky Coaster.
After about 10 minutes of waiting with the already intense rain getting even worse, the coaster ceased operation but it ended up being more interesting than frustrating.
The operator shut the coaster down completely, including isolating the control console and ride electrics. Then he walked down the queueline informing people, “it’s going to be about 30 minutes, if you’d like to wait that’s ok”. After this he switched between contacting control on his radio and entertaining the kids at the front of the queue. 20 minutes later the rain died down, he turned it all back on, performed all the start up checks for the coaster and even explained how the block sections on the touch screen worked to the kids. Exactly 30 minutes after it closed the ride reopened in the most Japanese manner, including all the seats being wiped completely dry and bowing.
The coaster itself is quite fun and the scream powered launches are just so Japanese that you have to love it.
After the 2 coasters were knocked off we rode the park’s shooting dark ride, a ride style that by the end of this trip I was getting quite bored of but this was the first and I enjoyed it.
Next we checked out the park’s brand new ride Duel GP.
Duel GP – This thing was great!
2 cars race each other on what is essentially a really complicated duelling powered coaster. The fun part being that you have to steer your car and the challenge being that if you steer gently and precisely you’ll do well but if like me you can’t be gentle to save your life, you spin out on the corners and it slows you down. I’m not ashamed to admit I lost when I rode both tracks, though I’d argue it’s probably more fun to spend the entire ride spinning around and shouting anyway.
Suzuka Circuit really surprised me, I wrote it off as just a stop off on the way to better things but I ended up leaving quite fond of the park. Their willingness to run things in the rain and their wonderful customer service can’t be overlooked.
Due to the rain slowing us down, we were now running rather late and had quite significantly gone past the time we were due to leave the park. With this in mind and slightly worried the rain might have beaten us there, we thought it would be best to phone Parque Espana and check everything was still on for their 8pm close.
I ended up having one of the most amazing phone conversations of my life with a very confused Japanese woman. Did it answer any of my questions? No. Did I care? Also no.
The journey to Parque Espana was really impressive with crazy mountain roads and killer views. The best of these views however was seeing Pyrenees getting ever closer.
Parque Espana
We arrived at 4pm with an advertised 8pm close but having not seen Pyrenees move during the last 5 miles of the journey we were rather worried.
It was all for nothing though because as soon as we got out of the car Pyrenees dispatched onto the lift hill.
After buying our tickets, which were once again discounted, this time due to arriving after 3, we sprinted across the park into the waiting arms of Pyrenees!
Pyrenees – Now at the time I couldn’t believe it but even now I’m rather amazed that I was lucky enough to be able to ride what I consider to be the two legendary Asian inverts back to back.
Now while Phaethon was good, Pyrenees is in a completely different league, I’ll make it as simple as I can, this is the World’s greatest B&M invert and more than that it’s one of the best coasters in the World.
I can’t not mention that this coaster looks absolutely insane, the shaping on the first drop compared to Phaethon alone had me deeply concerned. Everything just screams that this coaster is going to kick ass and it does!
So you think the drop looks intense off ride? That’s nothing compared to how it rides.
The loop zero g loop start to Batman is one of my favourite opening sections on any coaster, so the fact Pyrenees borrows it on an enlarged scale is awesome. While the section doesn’t ride as intensely as Batman, when it’s coupled up with that ridiculous drop, it is an absolutely incredible way to start a coaster.
The madness is then followed by a snappy and intense cobra roll and only then does Pyrenees let you catch your breath, slightly. Next up is an almost helix through the second loop, a midcourse that barely slows you and a perfect example of a corkscrew.
It’s now that you can really catch your breath, because sadly Pyrenees does suffer a bit from the large invert habit of searching for the next bit to do, however it really is a short patch and it’s so out of place after the intensity before that it’s rather cute actually.
Then things pick back up with a rare example of an air time hill on an invert, followed by an intense floor hugging drop, before you’re swooped back into the station.
I knew after my first lap that I was really taken with Pyrenees but by the end of the night and after 5 laps I was in love.
Gran Montserrat – One of the biggest surprise hits of the trip belongs to this Mack mine train coaster, it’s surprisingly fast, way more intense than it looks and as you’d expect from Mack it’s butter smooth, for what it’s trying to be I can’t praise it enough.
With those beasts down we went looking for the park’s other major coaster, a search which led us around the entire park.
On route we rode the Nutcracker dark ride, which was weird, another shooting dark ride, which was meh and the park’s Peter Pan inspired dark ride, which was awesome.
Steampunk Coaster Iron Bull – I hope the photo of the beautiful building housing it sums why it took it so long to find this enclosed Togo coaster, it’s hardly screaming in your face and I love that.
Some call this coaster rough, it’s not but it is weird and hilarious and I also love that.
With everything done, including multiple re-rides, it was now park close and we decided to grab some food and watch the park’s closing fireworks.
How many parks in the World would bake you a pizza if you show’d up in the restaurant 5 minutes before park close and then proceeded to take most of them 5 minutes choosing said pizza? None?
Well Parque Espana did for us but not only that, the incredibly friendly elderly man insisted on us taking our seats and bringing it over himself, oh Japan you are too good to us.
Given the choice I’d easily be able to entertain myself for the day at this amazing park. From riding the World’s greatest B&M Invert, riding the fantastic Mack mine train, checking out the many dark rides and just enjoying the lovely theming.
Parque Espana much like the park before it blew expectations out of the water and ended up becoming one of the best parks on the trip.
Thanks for reading, click here for the next part of this report where we seek revenge on Nagashima Spa Land.
There were a couple of different types of ticket machine in Osaka. One type were friendly and were easy to use. The other type didn’t like us so much. The train station we used today only had the unfriendly ones, so there was much confusion. After a short battle with one, a wonderful passer-by noticed us and came to help us out. She gave us a detailed explanation on how to earn the trust of these machines and successfully got us some train tickets to Hirakata.
Oh look, another ferris wheel.
Day 8 – Hirakata Park
Having needed to fit in a special mission in the morning, time was not on our side for this park. With the flight back to Korea being later that afternoon, everything was done at an amusingly fast pace.
The first stop was #1 Fantastic Coaster Rowdy. It did inspire some rowdiness, due to a comedic sense of urgency and needing to take several shopping bags on board with us. It’s a small coaster with not much going on.
#2 Red Falcon restored the good name of jet coasters with some great views and one particularly amusing and jarring transition in the tracking.
#3 Crazy Mouse
This spinning coaster doesn’t spin. Different experience I guess.
#4 Peekaboo Town was almost as fantastic as Rowdy and 10 times smaller again. Amazing staff was a running theme in this park.
#5 Elf
Saved the supposed best for last with this little Intamin woodie. It was a bit underwhelming really, some harmless fun at best.
Still had time for a go on the Dark Ride shooter, Return of the Garg. Was quite impressed with the ride system and unusual scenery, but unfortunately none of us got a high enough score to win a prize as advertised. This may have replaced another dark ride that was here, we never found the one on that was our to-do list.
After successfully dodging a park mascot, we headed back out to the train station. A particularly troublesome but entertaining sequence of events followed, involving: – Running out of cash for the trains (creds at all costs, too many toll roads) – Not being able to take out cash anywhere – The hotel staff giving us great advice on how to get to the airport when collecting our luggage, only to then discover it was the wrong airport – Taxi drivers not understanding the word taxi – Arriving at the right airport 45 minutes before our flight was due to leave and it not being an issue in any way
A hectic but fun final day in Japan. Wouldn’t have it any other way.
It was a bit of a long shot tagging this park on to the trip by means of another dedicated hire car and turned out it certainly wasn’t worth doing this time around. Every day of the trip so far had been >30°C and not a cloud in the sky. Today there was a slight drizzle in the air and umbrella signs on the roads as we trundled towards Nagoya, not too concerned. Japan had been amazing to us, thus far.
There’s a massive sign up outside the entrance with some overwhelmingly confusing descriptions of what is open, what is meant to be open, what is closed, what is meant to be closed, what opens in ‘bad weather’, what is meant to be open in ‘bad weather’, what closes in ‘bad weather’ and what is meant to close in ‘bad weather’. 3 different members of staff gave 3 different answers to these questions, but they were mostly positive responses so we went for it anyway. Even pulling into the car park, the rides were already running and the park appears to be a ghost town, so what’s the worry?
Day 7 – Nagashima Spa Land
We headed straight round to Steel Dragon 2000 – the worlds’s longest coaster and a legendary name in the industry that we were very excited to ride, with its permanent physical sign saying 90 minute wait in front of it. Joined the queue and killed some time watching some painful operations up at the station. Moved a few feet in half an hour… That sounds like a ride closure announcement. A few school kids dropped out of the queue in front of us at this point but the majority of the guests remained and the staff seemed to keep things running for a while. With the pace at which we were moving however, it was clearly going to be well over the advertised 90 minutes and we have 12 other creds to hit today! (No, just no). “There’s a thing about fastrack on that sign, let’s check it out.” Gave up on the dismal queue and went round to the ride shop to try and buy some. “The ride’s closed boys.” Seriously? In the time it had taken for us to walk around, they had begun closing it all off and sending people away. Spite Dragon 2000.
#1 Arashi
The S&S freespin was next door and actually open so we sucked up an hour queue for that, all the while saying “what the hell has become of this day?” Was sort of dreading this, with Insane in the brain, but it was actually rather awesome. It does a lot of crazy flips, particularly at the start, but smoothly with none of the horrible lurching that you get on a Zacspin, providing a very intense but in no way disgusting ride.
Highlight: The video in the queue of a couple of Japanese girls having the time of their lives on it, summed up the ride experience perfectly. Lowlight: Shouldn’t have been the best ride of the day.
#2 Corkscrew was open, with an hour queue, and the light drizzle was starting to collect on the inside of my coat. Yes, this was the point where I noticed the true extent of the damage from the underfloor heating. Given the current situation, I was not amused. Slowly descending into insanity at this stage, the ride produced similar results to Rolling X-Train in that it was unnecessarily hilarious, but I couldn’t say why.
Highlight: Comedy Lowlight: Shouldn’t have been the second best ride of the day.
The #3 Jet Coaster was open and it seemed guests were already starting to disappear from the park as quickly as they had appeared. Highlight: No queue Lowlight: The magic was lost on this one, Nagashima managed to kill the concept.
This #4 Peter Rabbit powered Coaster was the only other attraction open. Might as well.
And that was Nagashima Spiteland.
Everything else was closed and remained that way.
Had some pizza for lunch and by the time that was done (around 14:00), it had stopped drizzling and the skies had cleared, but all the school trips and other guests had left the park, leaving us to wander around aimlessly in despair. Even those few rides from earlier had since closed, with the exception of Arashi, which it looked like they were just getting practice operation laps on, still being a new ride.
No member of staff could bring themselves to tell us what was going on now. What’s the procedure here? The park is open for another 3 hours. We are paying guests. The weather has cleared. What happens?
Staff were busying themselves around Steel Dragon, both in the queue and in the control box for the ride. We got as far as walking up the exit stairs and standing on the station platform looking at the train (could have sat in the seats if we wanted), ready to ask what was happening, but they all completely blanked us for the duration, actively avoiding us. I have never seen such a poor display from an amusement park.
Lost for words, we left the park in disgust and went to get ice cream. Japan immediately redeems itself as the staff ask: “Can I sing to you while I make it?” “Yes. Yes you can.” With big smiles back on our faces, we leave it all behind.
Now that we were in Osaka, there was only one obvious destination for us.
Day 6 – Universal Studios Japan
Seems there’s never a quiet day at this park, and deservedly so with such a strong line-up. It made for a bit of a worrying start when we were queuing for over half an hour just to get into the place, while watching all the fastrack packages sell out on the screens in front of us. Probably the only thing that deserves complaining about at this park is the way admissions are handled. You can’t buy online tickets direct from the park and all the ticket queues on the day are severely slowed down by people asking about and having explained to them the million different packages before deciding what they want on the spot. This is then further soured by the ridiculously overstated queue times everywhere within the park which you can’t help but think is their way of making more money out of people, though I don’t want to believe is the case.
Expecting to struggle, we tried to play things a bit tactically, but it wasn’t particularly necessary in the end.
Went for #1 VR Space Fantasy XR Evangelion: The Ride first as we knew the throughput was being halved by only running the forwards facing seats of what is usually a Mack spinning coaster and then further destroyed by the plague that is Virtual Reality. There are a couple of preshows as a build up to aliens coming to attack the city and then the VR involves aliens coming to attack the city.
Have to say I was majorly let down by this ride. I’ve seen it being extremely highly regarded in the past and I have a bit of a thing for a good indoor coaster with a strong layout and nice theming so it was supposed to be bucket list good. As we found it on this day, it was very weak as a coaster, like a mini Temple of the Nighthawk with its 3 lift hills and doing absolutely nothing in between them and sadly I don’t really see how it could have been hugely improved in the past, even with a bit of spinning. I guess I can say I haven’t truly experienced that bucket list coaster, but I’m also left very doubtful now. The VR itself was probably the best example I’ve seen so far, definitely the most detailed and well synced up. Doesn’t make me a fan of it though. Highlight: Played our cards right with the queue times Lowlight: Sad face
Scoped out the rest of the park and ticked off #2 Snoopy’s Great Race, the next cred next as it was walk on. Another Japanese version of what appears to be a Vekoma junior, this time by Senyo Kogyo Highlight: A camera wielding Snoopy animatronic interacting with the train. Lowlight: The building that housed it was like a furnace.
The stunt show/film scene simulating attraction Backdraft was good for the (FIRE!) but a little too much of a slow burn with many lengthy pre-shows. I prefer the Singapore equivalent. Didn’t know it was an actual film though, so learnt somethign new.
Turned up to Hogsmeade about 10 years too late to care, having been a huge fan of the books and the franchise until the final film adaptation went and soured it all for me. Opted for the dark ride first, Harry Potter and the Forbidden Journey, with or without the optional castle walkthrough section, I’m not sure what was going on. The entrance had the biggest locker nonsense I’ve experienced since Arthur, but we then walked straight through the very well themed queue and on to the ride, contrary to the 45 minute wait sign outside.
I quite liked this, even though a lot of it happens too fast. The ride system is a bit odd, with the robot arm chucking you into a very different mix of scenes ranging from half a second of breath-taking physical sets to some crappy screens with Harry on a broom waving at you. Almost can’t see how it all fits together (magic, obviously). Would have liked to give it a second go to let it sink in a bit more, but didn’t find the time in the end.
#3 Flight of the Hippogriff trains on the actual Vekoma junior coaster amuse me. Why is he made out of a wicker basket? Highlight: First of many instances in the park where staff notice my shirt and say “ooh, Universal, Mummy, Singapore!” And give me a huge grin and thumbs up. Perfect. Lowlight: Done far too many of these.
I was simply not prepared for how good Jaws was. This ride was just made for Japan with their excitable staff girls doing the talking, acting, boat driving and shark shooting. There were great crowd reactions every time the shark appeared. Great effects (FIRE!). Enjoyed every second of it.
#4 Flying Dinosaur
The new B&M flyer was claiming 120 minutes of queue but was about 40 in reality. There were more great crowd reactions every time the trains ‘assumed the (flying) position’ in the station, which was making for a good atmosphere after the very intensive loose item procedures.
What a fantastic flyer this is, they’ve finally nailed it. It has so many good sensations throughout and never really lets up. The initial inversion sequence is likely to be the most intense on the planet. Pretzel loops alone provide extremely powerful sensations as you get dropped on your head and all of the air is pushed out of your lungs, but you’re already reeling before you even reach this one due to the 540° twist and half loop combo that precedes it. It remains forceful and interesting throughout the rest of the ride and into the brakes, even though it doesn’t seem like any new ground is being covered by the second half of the layout. Came back for this later as it was getting dark and had another of those magical moments on a ride. Highlight: Perfect pacing, incredible intensity Lowlight: Nasty nets that ruin many photos
Jurassic Park – The Ride was decent, but I much prefer the rapids version to these big lumbering boats as you get a much more exposed feeling from the whole setup and a bit more of a ‘ride’ out of it. The ending drop was very impressive, but all the build up and drifting around beforehand just wasn’t quite as fun to me.
The Amazing Adventures of Spiderman was very good. I got hit with a sudden wave of tiredness mid-afternoon, so didn’t take in much of this simulator ride, just remember enjoying it at the time. Good effects, great vehicle movement, a solid package.
This tiredness continued into Terminator2:3-D, where a very long, standing preshow nearly finished me off. The acting was good though. Once in the comfy seats of the main theatre, I was drifting in and out of consciousness while gun fights were going off, so again didn’t take much in until the theatre seats dropped at the end and gave me a good wake up call. I was fine after that.
Wasted a chunk of time going for this new show in the Harry Potter land, expecting it to be a Universal class production. They had converted the whole area back into a time slot basis and everyone was totally confused by this, so staff were handing out little maps to the machines that would give you a ticket. The time slots on these tickets didn’t line up with the show times, so we had to sprint along with a crowd of people through some dark trees only to miss the first 30 seconds of it. The show was hilariously bad. A few actors were up in front of the castle chatting away and there were a couple of poor projections on the side of the building of some spells, followed by some killer comedy. There was an actor on the roof of one of the shops very, very, very slowly getting attacked by a Dementor (those evil cloak things) with really over the top suspenseful music, while the actors down in front just stood and stared at their friend dying like ‘sorry mate.’ The power of love or money won through in the end and there was a smattering of applause. Left the area almost as fast as we came in to go do something decent instead.
#5 Hollywood Dream: The Ride
The B&M hyper was claiming 90 minutes all day but was about 30 in reality. We started off with a forwards run, no gimmicks, and really enjoyed it. There’s a good unique feel to the layout for a hyper, the airtime is solid throughout and it’s a very aesthetically pleasing ride.
Came back right at the end of the day and went for the backwards facing train, in the dark, with a foreboding anime soundtrack coming from the seat and suddenly this ride was stupidly good. Not seeing things coming had a huge impact on how strong the airtime was and I all I could do was laugh with joy from start to finish. Make that 2 magical moments in one day. Amazing. Highlight: Limbs haven’t flown that uncontrollably since Helix. Lowlight: Jpop selection on the on board music wasn’t the Jpop I know and love.
It’s very easy to fill up your day here with so many attractions and would definitely be a struggle to get everything done if it was ‘busy’. We had a fantastic time with it all and would have loved to get a couple more re-rides in, particularly with that very strong coaster lineup. I even stood at the park entrance and longingly watched them sending the empty hyper trains home for the day before we departed.
Somehow we still managed to squeeze a bit more shopping into that evening.
Started the day with a ride on the beautiful Miss Nozomi (the bullet train) who dropped us off at Himeji Station. We used the lockers there to dump our bags for the duration while no less than a thousand school children walked past us in single file, every one of them smiling, waving and speaking various greetings. Went to the bus station outside and jumped on the next one to the castle. They had some interesting looking old fashion buses operating, but unfortunately we ended up with one of the regular ones.
Ticked off the culture cred.
And the cat cred.
The castle comes with a vending machine that had melon Fanta. I had been promised ‘all the Fantas of the world’ on this trip, but we only found 2 that were new to us in the end.
Took another bus from there to our park for the day.
Himeji Central Theme Park/Zoo/Waterpark.
Got that all included one very expensive ticket, whether you want it or not.
#1 Camelback Jet Coaster
Highlight: Everything I wanted and more. Lowlight: Disappointingly for a zoo, no camels included.
#2 Imorinth Highlight: My first time having just a single lap on one of these Wacky Worms. A proud moment. Lowlight: £10 a head
#3 Labyrinth Highlight: Good odd fun in this unusual coaster that was sort of trying to be a wild mouse. Lowlight: Lack of legroom (that keeps coming up)
I loved the rubber escalator in this park that takes you up the hill. What I love even more is the fact that it used to be an upcharge attraction.
These old Intamin drop towers have quite an unnerving aesthetic. Thankfully the whole end sequence when you end up on your back for the brakes was a bit of a blur and I didn’t really notice being tipped on my head to get back to the station.
#4 Diavlo
Highlight: This B&M invert clone has a great setting and is good to look at. Lowlight: Felt a bit weak for a Batman layout, it doesn’t get enough ridership obviously.
#5 Hurricane – Screw & Loop Coaster
More worrying Togo encounters that proved to be entirely unjustified. Had a good laugh on this one and no troubles at all. Highlight: The speed hump at the end. Lowlight: Discount GoPro in your face in case you want to buy the video.
Another day another ferris wheel. Great views but some unnerving noises on this one.
The park was a bit of a disappointment overall, even once we had gotten over the extortionate cost. I remember looking at pictures of Diavlo in the mountains long ago and thinking “wow, that looks like a fantastic place to visit.” In reality, it feels rather run down and tired. Once again none of the attractions were particularly outstanding and we didn’t feel like hanging around any longer. Bus times were awkward to get back out of the place in the middle of the day, so we asked guest services to find us a taxi.
A 90 year old man picked us up and took us back to the train station. He was greatly amused by our reading out of the ‘things to do in Himeji’ leaflet we had picked up.
Hopped on the regular train to Osaka from there and spent the rest of the day exploring the next city and its endless shops.
What the hotel lacked in food, it made up for in convenience. Just 15 minutes and £30 pounds of tolls up the road was our next park. This was to be the final season of operation for Space World, so we felt very fortunate to have made it in time. Day 4 – Space World
It was a bit of an odd sensation being able to drive alongside Stealth’s launch track to get to the car park. Bought a ticket from an actual alien and parked up.
Opted to head round to the Intamin launch clone first.
#1 Zaturn
Not much to report really, it was the same beast but cleaner. Highlight: Not Thorpe Park. Lowlight: Locker faff.
#2 Titan MAX
The Arrow hyper was up next, with a rather painfully slow queue. An audio announcement kept repeating the name of the ride in a cute accent, so that helped a little.
Grabbed the back row, picked a good on-board tune to listen to with the buttons on the restraint and crept up the lift hill in anticipation. I thought these replacement trains were meant to be an improvement, but something went wrong somewhere. Instead of your standard first drop, back row ejector sensation, there was some sort of collision between the wheels and the rails and it only continued to jolt itself stupidly around the layout for the next couple of minutes. There might have been some forces somewhere, but everything was drowned out by it riding so terribly. It’s a shame really, the layout is a lot more interesting than something like Big One and I imagine it could have been half decent if executed properly. Highlight: Laughing at the catastrophe. Lowlight: The catastrophe.
We had a look in some shops on the way past and they had some decent merch with statements in recognition of their final year. There were also a couple of walls outside which you could write your farewells to the park on with the pens provided. Kinda gives you the feels.
#3 Boogie-woogie Space Coaster
We opted to sit forwards rather than backwards on this relatively small jet coaster for throughput reasons. Highlight: Staff were great at hyping the ride up and getting people excited. Lowlight: It didn’t really deliver.
#4 Venus GP
This one of a kind Maurer looper was running quite a bit more efficiently than the other creds. It was as good fun as it looks. The loop itself and lots of very heavily banked corners give it the intense feel of an almost Olympia Looping (bad restraints included). Highlight: Watching people trying to cope with taking bags on ride for the only ride in Asia for which that seems to be allowed. Lowlight: Bit of a weird jolt in the first hill
Had some crepes while waiting for the final outdoor coaster to open. I learnt here that they’re apparently a Japanese cuisine… Review of a man who hasn’t really eaten anything for 3 days: “I’ve had better.”
#5 Clipper
What appears to be Togo’s version of a Vekoma junior coaster was a good laugh for its size. Highlight: +1 Lowlight: Weird lunchtime closures
Jumped on another ferris wheel for the views and a sit down. A couple of nice touches on this one in that they give you a pair of viewing binoculars and there’s a notepad and pens in each pod, for inspired sketching?
There was one more cred to go, but no such luck. Required a bit of a hunt in the big indoor section to find it but staff outside said it was spiting.
We had achieved everything we felt necessary at a reasonably leisurely pace, so headed out to the car.
Space World was an odd place really. It still had a good sense of fun about it but felt perhaps not quite as ‘nice’ as Greenland the previous day. Again, nothing amazing to go back for. Aww…
Sort of on the cards, if we had been quick, was a trip to a park called Kijima Kogen. I found it on the sat nav and made the following statement: “We’ll get there at 16:55 and it’ll cost us £70 pounds in tolls.” That’s a no then.
Side note: I’m always hearing stories from people about places that are expensive (Scandinavia, Singapore etc.) and then starting arguments with such people. I had always put it down to tourist traps and a foolish necessity for coffee, beer or whatever people are into these days. If you played it smart, they were never any worse than back home. Japan is expensive. Just to exist in. There is no avoiding it. All major roads are tolled very heavily. Parks, trains, food, entertainment and shopping are all comparatively expensive no matter how you go about it. At regular points from this moment onwards, we would jokingly say how much something just cost us in pounds and all you could do was laugh out loud. Not a complaint at all because it’s just the most lovely place. I call it Awesome Tax.
Had a couple of +1 alternatives written down and plumped for the following as it was the most convenient/decent looking thing on the way back to Fukuoka.
Kashiikaen Yuenchi
Plenty of fun faff here with car parks and getting into the place. With the tactic of driving physically as close as possible to the coaster, ended up in a car dealership. From there we were pointed to the car park for Sylvanian Family Land.
Having not made a connection between the two, we took a long walk around the perimeter of all that to the back of the coaster and wandered into another park entrance that end. It turns out it is all one park, seeming to be going through a UK-style massive kid’s brand overhaul. But we went in the ‘cool’ entrance at least.
#6 Pegasus
The main attraction was another glorious Jet Coaster. Highlight: “Think of the rare points on coaster count!” Lowlight: More ridership than T-Express
#7 Boom-Boom Coaster
The only other cred was yet another Powered Dragon thing. Highlight: Name Lowlight: Shame
Job done. Exited through Sylvanian Family Land into our actual car park and headed off into the city to drop off our vehicle and have a night in Fabulous Fukuoka. Car hire staff were extra nice. They usually only shuttle customers to and from the airport, but after explaining we wanted to take a train the next day, they dropped us off downtown instead.
I thought I’d died and gone to hell, waking up to the intense heat in the room sometime late the next morning, but soon remembered it was actually heaven. The suitcases lying on the now searingly hot floor had some rather damaged goods inside, namely melted food and a raincoat that I would later find out had had its waterproofing destroyed. In stark contrast, the ‘fridge’ in the room had frozen a couple of our carbonated drinks. Everything was working in extremes.
Day 2
So Japan was never originally on the cards for this trip. The eventual motivation behind the rushed first half of the Korea leg was twofold. 1) Upcoming Space World spite. 2) If you transit through Seoul within 72 hours you are entitled to some free tickets to go and watch the live recording of a Kpop chart TV show. Well that just had to happen.
And that happened on this day.
Passed some time with some sightseeing and a leisurely lunch nearby.
Didn’t feel like getting dressed up in traditional garb for the free entry inside the temple, but it’s a big thing for the young locals. See if you can spot them.
After overestimating the speed of the metro, we got to the TV studio with just minutes to spare and ended up accidentally joining the line of jealous fans that weren’t actually able to go inside and watch. Awkward. Eventually found our way inside and sat just a few metres from the stage and cameras to watch all the magnificence unfold. More life changing stuff, but I won’t go into detail.
Tried and failed to get an early night (seems to be impossible in Asia) and then at stupid o’clock we were off to Japan.
Landed in Fukuoka the next morning and took a little while to discover that the ‘airport car hire’ wasn’t actually at the airport. With a bit of faff and a phone call, a bloke in a minivan came to pick us up, all good. Got the car and within a couple of minutes of driving things got interesting. There are 2 types of toll road in Japan – some are robots and some are people. The first one we came across didn’t have a machine, but there was definitely no sign of a person either. There was no barrier. What do we do? “Go for it”, I hear, and do. “STOOOOOOP!” A man appears out of nowhere, slightly bemused and asks us for the cash. As if we weren’t misbehaving enough already, we passed him some Korean coins by mistake. All in good humour, he sorted us out in the end. Sorry Japan.
It was a pleasant drive down, taken at a very humble pace (Japan never lets you do more than 60Mph in a car). We were soon greeted by the sight of the first of a million ferris wheels in this part of the world. Lesson not learnt from earlier, we gave the parking attendant some Korean coins by mistake. It took him a little longer to notice as we had already parked the car before seeing the poor chap come running towards us. All in good humour, he sorted us out in the end. Sorry Japan.
Day 3 – Greenland
Got some entrance tickets and ride wristbands and headed in for what was to be a fairly hefty +1 marathon. The admissions girl came running over as we passed through the turnstiles and was deeply apologetic for having not given us the correct change. See. We’re not the only ones.
#1 Gao
The longest coaster in the park came first and I fell in love with Japanese Jet Coasters as a concept.
They’re such a relaxing little sit down, breeze in your hair, trundling along at unknown speeds, unknown height, having a good laugh. Nothing like those boring, thrilling western coasters. Highlight: Getting front row and being able to watch the dinosaur on the front of the train as we went round. Lowlight: Honestly can’t think of one.
#2 & #3 Milky Way (Blue & Pink)
On to my first Togo ride. Stand-up version first. This was great fun. It had forces I didn’t expect to take direct to the legs and the design of the trains puts you in a very exposed position compared to anything I had done previously. Highlight: Restored faith in stand-up coasters Lowlight: Restored faith in stand-up coasters
The sit-down side of the ride was fairly inoffensive and forgettable in comparison. The on-board music was a little odd, playing what reminded me of Wild West chase music. It was good for a race, but not very befitting of the Milky Way name. Highlight: More pink rides for the count Lowlight: Unnecessary shoulder restraints
#4 Grampus Jet
This Vekoma suspended coaster has a great name and great looking cars. Highlight: Much better than the last one of these I did at Bobbejaanlend. All I needed. Lowlight: Still a bit dull.
#5 Ladybird is a powered dragon nearby that isn’t a dragon. Didn’t expect to ride another one so soon…
#6 Ultra Twister Megaton (#300)
The namesake of this website and what was to be my 300th coaster was now, unbelievably, standing right in front of me. These are weird contraptions, in a very good way. Life feels a little less natural when you’re surrounded by cages and grease, which is basically what the cars are made of. The vertical lift hill is unnerving, particularly as I didn’t know rides of this era could even do that (these were potentially the first, though they seemingly never found fame for it – justice for the Heartline Coaster!) and the resultant pitching you over the edge into the first drop and following hill is great fun. Highlight: The backwards inversions catching me off guard. Lowlight: Bit of a car crash on the transfer section.
#7 Nio
Highlight: Middle of the road SLC on this particular day. Lowlight: Having done enough SLCs to make statements like that.
#8 Blackhole Coaster
Another, larger powered coaster, mostly in the dark. It was alright I guess, mostly forgettable.
#9 Spin Mouse
Scraping the barrel for creds a bit now. Highlight: Being handed a personal pouchie for my glasses was a nice touch. Lowlight: Done far too many of these and they never beat Brighton Pier. What’s up with that?
#10 Sphinx
This smaller jet coaster is as fun as it looks. Highlight: Killer layout. Lowlight: Lack of leg room.
Having polished off all the creds in good time, we took a spin on the ferris wheel for some views.
Again, as a park, Greenland was a very nice place to be, with many interesting and quirky coasters on offer. Sadly it didn’t quite have anything amazing enough to rush back for, though I didn’t really expect it to. A good day out, that’s all you really need.
Our hotel that evening was very nice, though in a somewhat rural location It had absolutely no food options nearby, so finding something to eat was particularly troublesome.
Today was our last day in Japan and we were determined to end it on a high after yesterday’s nightmare. Things were off to a good start when a friendly lady came over to help us buy our train tickets and with them in hand we were in for a pleasant train ride to Hirakata Park.
Hirakata Park
With just a few hours left before we needed to the be at the airport we knew that as soon as we arrived we needed to hit the ground running. This was a massive shame in a way because Hirakata Park was a lovely little park and had a very simular feel to Greenland and Space World in that the staff were wonderful, it felt very “Japanese” and it was a rather pleasant place to just exist in. The perfect place to end our Japanese park list, just like Greenland had been the perfect place to start.
Crazy Mouse – Nothing special at all to this Reverchon spinning coaster, except the staff who were wonderful.
Elf – Adorable family sized Intamin woodie, nothing stand out but certainly a fun little coaster.
Fantastic Coaster Rowdy – I think they put more effort into the name than the coaster itself but I’m totally ok with that.
Peekaboo Town – The experience of a beautiful ride operator wedging my proportions into this tiny coaster is better than the ride could ever be.
Red Falcon – Maybe the best jet coaster yet. This time thinking to myself, “what an amazing trip I’ve had to Japan, also note to self, burn down Nagashima Spa Land”. The perfect coaster at the perfect park to finish up Japan.
We all left the park buzzing and with plenty of time spare to take it easy on route to the airport, then of course it went wrong.
As a group we completely ran out of Japanese currency between Hirakata Park and the hotel to collect luggage and due to reasons you couldn’t use credit cards on the Japanese subways. So we left the subway system to find a cash machine. First one didn’t take UK cards and the second one had a minimum spend of something laughable. After too much hassle we found one suitable and took out what we assumed was enough to get us to the airport.
After picking up our bags we ran to Osaka station where we learnt taxi drivers in the taxi rink don’t understand the word taxi and Osaka has 2 airports and we don’t know which one we need. We were already running majorly late now and couldn’t affford anymore confusion so we asked the information counter in the station which airport did we need and please sell us tickets for it.
The airport we needed was over an hour away and we didn’t have enough money to buy the tickets, so Heartline launched out of the station to look for another cash machine while I did some maths. At best we were going to arrive at the airport 45 minutes before the plane is due to take off, at worst and most likely we were going to miss our flight.
We managed to check into our flight after 30 minutes of bad signal on the subway but ultimately we all just assumed we were screwed. That was until after running through Osaka airport we got to the check in desk where they allowed us to check in our bags and made no fuss at all that we arrived so late. Then finally after an intense queue for security we got to our gate and collapsed in relief, we had made it.
Finally at peace, we landed in Korea at about 8pm and this time instead of taking the high speed train to Seoul station, then the subway to our new hotel, we opted to just board the subway at the airport and slum it the whole way which took forever. By the time we were all settled into the hotel it was midnight and we had to be up in 6 hours for Lotte World, I’d never complain but these trips really do test how dedicated you are for this game.
Thanks for reading, click here for our first day back in Korea, featuring Lotte World!
Our original trip line up did not include Nagashima Spa Land but Heartline went to an immense effort reordering everything so we could have a day at what I consider one of the two (other one is Fuji Q) legendary Japanese parks. After this experience however my opinion of Nagashima Spa Land has been forever ruined, am I going too far, I’ll let you decide.
We had planned and tried every option of getting to the park for it’s 9 opening but due to the worst case of car hire faff to ever exist we pulled into the car park at 10.
Nagashima Spa Land
It was lightly spitting with rain as we walked to the ticket office and noticed a sign saying half the park was closed today. Then we looked at another ride closures sign on the ticket office window that said only 3 rides were closed today. So we asked the very rude man selling tickets what was occuring. The 3 mentioned rides were down all day (note the website did not mention this on it’s maintenance page) and the sign with half the park listed as closed was because of the slight rain. We made sure to ask him extemely carefully, “if the rain stops only the 3 rides listed on this sign are closed?”. “YES!” he snapped back, well we’ve no reason to believe he’s lying, let’s do it.
We ran to Steel Dragon and joined the back of what looked to be at least an hour queue. On the way there we saw a sign that said that Steel Dragon was closing at 3 for maintenance. It was now half 10, Steel Dragon’s going down at 3, the park closes at 5 and there’s at least 10 more coasters to ride, plus the rain has just gotten heavier. With that in mind we decided to leave the queue and buy fast track for Steel Dragon from the Steel Dragon photos kiosk. The very rude woman snapped at us and responded that the ride was closed.
Arashi – With everything going to hell we joined the 45 minute queue for the park’s brand new S&S Free Spin coaster. At the time I really wasn’t a fan of Arashi but with a revisit I love it to pieces, so just call my first opinion based on the mood at the time.
We noticed that Steel Dragon now had a very rude man blocking the entrance and we were getting desperate for answers so went over to him. “If the rain stops Steel Dragon WILL reopen?”. “YES!” he angrily snapped back.
Corkscrew – All I remember of the park’s Arrow corkscrew coaster was getting wet, the staff being very rude and all hope for today being lost.
Jet Coaster – As well as the staff being very rude, the visitors to Nagashima Spa Land were disgusting. We’d seen school children in almost all the parks and they were completely fine elsewhere but at Nagashima Spa Land they were awful. We were queue jumped, barged into and then had our seats stolen on Jet Coaster. I spent the whole ride wondering if this whole day was just setting out to annoy me because it was working.
Peter Rabbit Coaster – Amazingly the park opened their children’s powered coaster in the rain but almost nothing else.
4 attractions that we wanted running in the entire park, so we went looking for food and a place to sit down. We ended up in a children’s oriented pizza restaurant because like the rides almost all the restaurants were closed too. During our meal the rain stopped completely, not only that but the sun came back too, so we sat there waiting and watching to see if anything moved for over an hour.
We got bored of waiting and because we’d heard it multiple times that things would reopen when the rain stopped, it was time to ask again.
Off to Steel Dragon and we stood at the entrance for over 15 minutes while the staff completely ignored us. A very rude staff member was in the control box, 4 or 5 were cleaning the queue, all could see us, none of them wanted to help. So getting angry we walked up the exit stairs and stood on the station platform, the very rude man in the control box hid under the console and those in queue still pretended they didn’t see us, unbelievable.
We asked a member of the Arashi team when was Steel Dragon going to reopen and she said tomorrow. It’s now 2pm, the sun’s shining, there’s 3 hours of operations left but Steel Dragon’s not coming back and nothing else is happening to the other closed rides.
It was clear then that the park had just given up because there was a few hours rain in the morning. I’ve since ridden Japanese coasters in downpours and witnessed Japanese park’s reopen as soon as bad weather stops so there’s no excuse at all for what the park was doing. Not only that but the fact that several staff members told us that when the rain stops everything reopens just made it even more insulting.
Talking of the staff they for the most part were all extremely rude, condescending and very un Japanese.
Nagashima Spa Land managed to morph from one of the most exciting parks of this trip into a park I’m in no hurry to ever return to.
In case you are wondering I deleted all my pictures of the park in disgust, I apologise for the lack of visuals in this report.
Thanks for reading, click here for day 8 where Japan redeems itself and we visit Hirakata Park.
