TR: 2005 Japanese Coaster Tour (part 1 of 5)

TR: 2005 Japanese Coaster Tour

Part 1 of 5

When the ECC/ACE Japan trip was announced for 2005, my interest in making a
trip to Japan was sparked. I figured I would definitely have to make the
trip. Last fall however, I saw Theme Park Review's Japan trip reports along
with a trip planning guide and soon realized I may be able to do such a trip
on my own. I wasn't totally satisfied with the club trip as far as the
timing, parks and costs. But the TPR website gave me enough information to
start investigating doing a Japan trip independently. With a good head start
on information gathering thanks to Robb & Elissa Alvey's groundwork, I
jumped into planning mode about 9 months ago. My potential roommate for the
club trip, Greg Legowski, agreed to join me in trying to do our own trip to
Japan. I'm happy to report we recently completed a very successful journey
to Japan.

This trip report will start with many trip details and hints in case anyone
wants to use our trip as a guide for their own trip. If it is a bit long
winded I hope you will be able to at least skim through the park and
coasters details.

Before I begin the daily reports, I'd like to explain the timing of our
trip. Based on the fact that the biggest enemy to a coaster trip to Japan is
rain with its potential to close down many coasters and rides, we wanted to
find a timeframe where we had a good chance of avoiding rain. The rainy
season ends in July while the typhoon season peaks in September. Spring and
late fall may have been better options as we hit some extreme heat and
humidity at times but spring was a bit soon for me as far as planning goes
and fall interrupts football season for me. So we were left with August. We
had to wait until the week long Obon holiday was over as much of Japan is in
transit at that time. We had a very tight window of about two weeks but
that's all we really needed so it worked out. We supposedly overlapped the
summer school holiday but I don't believe that really impacted our trip. We
saw many children going to school on trains so many schools were in session
during our trip.

Friday, Aug 19 - Departure

I arrived at Pittsburgh International early on Friday morning to head to
Newark Liberty for my Continental flight to Tokyo Narita airport. The flight
to Tokyo took about 14.5 hours. Somehow I was able to get in the right frame
of mind to deal with such a long flight.

Saturday, Aug 20 - Arrival in Tokyo and the Shinjuku experience

Upon arrival at Narita I met up with Greg Legowski who flew out the day
before. We proceeded to the JR (Japan Rail) reservation center to get rail
passes processed and to get our major reservations set for the trip. The JR
Pass is one of the greatest travel deals you'll find. For about the price of
a moderately priced airline ticket, you can get a week's worth of travel on
all types of JR trains which run all over Japan. Consider that each
shinkansen (or bullet train) ride costs about as much as a plane ticket we
saved tons of money with this pass. I'd say the JR pass covered at least 75%
of our train travel with the rest being cheaper and more local trains and
subway systems. Plus all JR reservations are free and you can make them
within minutes of a train leaving.

We had all of the shinkansen and Narita Express (airport express train)
return times listed on paper. Our agent was great and took care of
everything for us. I'd recommend getting as many reservations as you can set
up at Narita airport as they speak English very well and the atmosphere is
calmer than at the train stations. Plus they'll print more English on your
reservation tickets than they do at the train stations. Japan guidebooks
show you how to translate the reservation ticket but every extra bit of
English makes life easier in Japan.

After finishing our business at the JR reservation center, we went down to
the Narita Express platform to take the train into Tokyo. The "NEX" is
reservation only and would normally cost $60 to make the one hour trip. The
train was very comfortable and it was the most direct way to get to our base
hotel for the next four days in the Shinjuku area of Tokyo. I'll point out
that the trains in Japan are always perfectly on time and are very
dependable. If the trains are running they will be on time. They only shut
down in extreme cases like a typhoon hitting. Trains are so timely that if
you know how long your journey is supposed to be you could exit a train by
only using your watch and not the station signs. Also, on most platforms
they have updated electric signs with detailed information, many times
alternating in Japanese and English.

We arrived at Shinjuku station in the late afternoon and tried to figure out
how to exit the station and find the hotel shuttle bus. We soon realized how
nearly impossible and intimidating Shinjuku station was. This is the busiest
train station in the world with 1.5 million people passing through every
day! Nothing in New York City can even come close to preparing you for this
place. It is utterly confusing and even outside of the station large
buildings block your access for several city blocks. One thing we learned
rather quickly is that people walk on the left in Japan. They drive on the
left so they also walk on the left. I don't recall the same phenomenon in
England. Anyhow, after about an hour we found the area we thought the hotel
shuttle bus should have been in but we couldn't figure out exactly where it
should depart. Without much of a clue we decided to walk to the hotel,
pulling our luggage, since it wasn't too far away. But like the train
station, the Shinjuku area is rather chopped up and finding our way was
confusing. I used the Park Hyatt Hotel, from "Lost in Translation," as my
landmark and we worked our way back to our hotel, the Shinjuku New City
Hotel.

I should point out that I also used the ultra detailed "Tokyo City Atlas" I
had with me. This book is an absolute must for anyone traveling to Tokyo. It
kept us on the right path many times and helped us figure out the tangled
mess of train and subway routes in Tokyo. There are several train and subway
companies that tend to serve similar purposes in Tokyo. It's a big mix that
we eventually got a handle on. But the atlas was an essential tool with all
of the street and train maps you'll need.

At this point I'll mention a great all around website about Japan and
Japanese travel called Japan Guide. For train schedules, visit both the
Jourdan site and the Hyperdia. They are both 100% accurate. See the links
below.

http://www.japan-guide.com/

http://www.jorudan.co.jp/english/norikae/

http://grace.hyperdia.com/cgi-english/hyperd01.cgi

We arrived at the hotel tired and sweaty. It was hot and humid in Tokyo that
day as it was most of our trip. Checking in the hotel intimidated me a bit
but the staff spoke enough English that things worked out. This hotel was
actually the one with the least impressive staff as the other hotel staffs
spoke much better English and were more helpful than the Shinjuku New City
Hotel staff. They weren't bad but standards for service in Japan are very
high. We did have a problem as they did not have two beds in our room. They
were able to correct the problem but I was wondering if I made this mistake
with every hotel. It turns out that I must have booked the correct room type
for the rest of the trip and this problem was the hotel's mistake. All
reservations were made (and prepaid) on asiarooms.com. This hotel wasn't our
first choice but since the Shinjuku Washington Hotel was not available the
New City was suggested to us as an alternative.

While this hotel was probably my least favorite of the trip, it was clean
and had the basics we needed. A hotel of this caliber in New York City would
cost at least double what we paid in Tokyo. All rooms we had in Japan were
small as we expected but they all had mini fridges which was a nice bonus.
The bathrooms were very small and more primitive than we were used to except
for the toilets which had all kind of controls. We always had slippers and
robes in our rooms which we really didn't need for our western style lodging
needs. Most hotels had Internet access via stations in the lobby or access
in the rooms. The room phones were to hard to figure out with my phone card
but I eventually figured out how to use my phone card on the pay phones.
Beverage vending machines were always plentiful in the hotels as well as
everywhere in Japan.

After settling into the hotel I knew that I was in no condition to attempt
to get out to La Qua that night to get some riding in. But we did manage to
take the hotel shuttle bus back to Shinjuku station to look for some food
and check out the area. We found out our mistake with the shuttle bus pickup
area. It was on a lower level that we didn't even see. But we took note that
we had to pick up the shuttle on the corner opposite of the big neon Subaru
sign. We proceeded to an incredibly lit up gaming area of Shinjuku. We had
trouble picking a place out to eat as we wanted picture menus and a
welcoming restaurant. We peeked into one place and a passer by shook his
head at us. Some places don't accept gaijin (foreigners) like us. But we did
find a counter service place with Japanese food. We put money in a machine,
pushed a button that matched the picture of the meal we wanted and got a
ticket. We gave the ticket to the counter guy and our food came out shortly.
That was easy enough. Not the highest quality food but it was a good first
taste of Japan.

Food choices were a bit tough on the trip. While I found enough things I
liked to eat in Japan, Greg is diabetic and has a wheat allergy so he had to
choose first. Then I had to agree with the choice or try again. I typically
wanted food with bread or noodles in the dish so that was a challenge. Many
restaurants had picture menus or plastic food along with people who could
make out enough English to help us out. We knew some key words and phrases
in Japanese so it was a mutual effort.

After eating and looking around Shinjuku briefly, we picked up the hotel
shuttle and headed back. We needed some rest for what was the craziest
schedule of the trip on Sunday.

Sunday, Aug 21 - Toshimaen, Hanayashiki, La Qua and Sega Joypolis

Luckily we were able to wake up early without being sleepy. Getting adjusted
to the time in Tokyo wasn't too hard since it was so far away from home it
was almost like skipping a day. I wasn't feeling all that great but I
realized it was probably due to caffeine withdrawal as I had avoided it on
the plane. After arriving in Japan I didn't find any Diet Coke in the
vending machines. So I found some cold coffee in the vending machine and
caffeinated myself. I got used to the canned coffee and in this case it got
me feeling good for the day. Luckily we found that the convenience stores,
which were everywhere, had our treasured Diet Coke and along the way we
found the occasional vending machine with diet cola.

We picked up the hotel shuttle and headed over to Shinjuku station. We
scoped out some storage lockers for later in the trip and found a nice
little bakery which had breakfast food for both of us. It was hard to find a
place to actually eat our food as seats in train stations are limited to the
train platforms for the most part. Even tougher was finding somewhere to
throw our trash away. While Japan is nearly litter free, there are very few
garbage cans. I can't quite figure it out. Bathrooms don't even had garbage
cans. You're lucky if you find hand soap, towels or dryers in bathrooms.
Luckily parks tended to have a few more garbage and recycling cans than out
on the streets or in the train stations but that was sometimes inconvenient
for us.

Today we'd mostly use the Toei subway line. We bought a Toei/Tokyo Subway
day pass and saved some money on our travels. We had four stops on our
itinerary. They were Toshimaen, Hanayashiki, La Qua and Sega Joypolis. After
Sega Joypolis closed due to the skydiving simulator accident, I added
Toshimaen since I heard it was a nice little park. But Sega Joypolis
reopened just before our trip and we felt we should try to get there. So we
thought we'd have just enough time to do everything in one day. Most parks
in Japan close fairly early but La Qua, Sega Joypolis and Disney were open
late so we took advantage of those parks in the evenings.

Toshimaen was very close to the Toei subway station. We could tell early on
that the park was a nicely wooded park despite its location in Tokyo. I'd
call this park the Kennywood of Japan. It just had a certain feel and look.
Having a Swing Around and a Flying Carpet didn't hurt the comparison along
with a shuttle loop in honor of the old Laser Loop. Strangely, most parks in
Japan seemed to have Flying Carpet and/or Swing Around rides.

We had some confusion buying our free pass (ride all day) since the rides
were the same price as the water park and there was no English on the sign.
I had a price written down on my notes but in this case it didn't help. It
turns out we bought the wrong pass as we were denied access to Cyclone
coaster. I did notice while in line that our pass looked different than the
others. Luckily, inside the park was another ticket booth where they kindly
helped us change our pass type. We had to pay another 400 yen ($4) for some
reason (possibly a combo pass price) but we were glad that was all we had to
pay at that point. The pass was a paper ticket at this park and not a
wristband so we had to be careful not to lose it.

We headed back to the Cyclone coaster and found a long line. The nearby
Corkscrew had just opened with no line so we rode it first. It was a
standard Arrow corkscrew with Drachen Fire style trains. The ride was
typical and not too rough for the style of coaster.

Next up was the Cyclone. This is a 1965 Togo steel family style coaster. It
looks a lot like the sooperdooperLooper at HP with its blue steel structure
but it doesn't have a loop. It has log style cars (popular in Japan for some
reason) with velvet seats and only a seatbelt for a restraint. It was mostly
a scenic ride but the unexpected tunneled helix was a nice surprise. I would
have loved to have ridden it again but due to limited time, one train
operation and a long line we could only ride the coaster one time. Most
coasters in Japan only ran one train and often times we only had enough time
to ride each coaster once. Most of the time the operators were efficient as
possible but with one train and certain procedures, like having storage
lockers or wiping off the seats, caused slow operations on most coasters in
Japan.

The Shuttle Loop wasn't open yet (it was scheduled to open at 12 noon we
later discovered) so we rode a few other rides. We rode the Mystery Zone
dark ride and walked through the Ghost Residence. I can't recall many
details of the dark attractions in Japan because we did so many of them and
they were mostly unspectacular. But I did like the Japanese themes found in
most of them. I think the only flat ride we rode was the Huss Magic. It was
OK but certainly not running at German fair speed. We were impressed by the
dual giant pirate ship rides but we skipped them because we knew we'd
probably have time to ride it at Nagashima Spaland. Strangely, the park did
not have a Ferris wheel as almost every other park had one. The Japanese
love them as they don't kiss in public but they are allowed to kiss on
Ferris wheels from what I've been told. We saw so many random Ferris wheels
all over Japan it was hard to believe. They're almost as numerous as the
netted driving ranges that are everywhere in Japan and extremely popular.
Also plentiful all over Japan are pachinko parlors.

The Shuttle Loop eventually opened at noon. It has a strange partial
covering over the loop. This was a flywheel model and a very good one at
that. It would be right behind Monte at Knott's in my estimation. After some
lunch and video/picture taking, we were off to Hanayashiki.

Hanayashiki is in the Asakusa area of Tokyo. It is very close to the famous
Sensoji temple so we were able to check out that area after our park visit.
We probably should have walked through the area first as it was the best way
to get to the park but we took a more round about way, having trouble
actually getting into the park. The park and its Bee Tower were visible but
we had to walk all around the park to get in. It wasn't the best area of
Tokyo but with crime not being much of a concern it didn't matter much. When
we passed by the Sensoji marketplace area, we actually ran into some college
students looking to show English speaking people around the area. We had to
decline since we mostly wanted to get to Hanayashiki and that wasn't part of
their agenda either. But it was an interesting encounter.

While Hanayashiki has the oldest existing steel coaster in the world, the
Bee Tower circle swing ride caught our attention. Unfortunately we looked to
ride it after getting our coaster credit but it had just gone down and by
the time we had to leave it was still down. That was definitely a
disappointment but I was able to see it run and get some video of it. But
the Roller Coaster was well worth it. I thought it would be more of a kiddie
coaster but it encircles the entire park. It's more of a family coaster with
cool NAD looking cars. It's a fun ride with a surprising tunnel near the
end.

The entire park is very compact and layered with an Arabian theme. Despite
the stacked nature of the park it has a nice Japanese garden in the middle.
We only bought a couple books of tickets so we were only able to ride a few
things. Since the Bee Tower was down we opted to ride the dark ride. It was
weird in that it went through a tarp covered area. I recall a funny scene
with 70s music. We skipped the Star ride which is like a powered Looper
ride. A little too much spinning for weary travelers.

On the way back to the train station we passed through the Sensoji temple
area. It was overrun with tourists and was a bit worn out with more fair
style booths set up all around than I would have expected for a temple. Greg
stopped for some steak on a stick at one of the booths. But the temple
buildings were very cool to see even if we were just passing by.

We took the Toei line over to the Tokyo Dome area so we could visit La Qua.
The Yomiuri Giants, the New York Yankees of Japan baseball, were playing a
game at the dome but that didn't impact us very much. We were able to get a
discounted evening pass, this time an actual wristband that was scanned each
time. Most parks in Japan had scanners for wristbands or tickets. The only
problem is that they had some kind of date night promotion so it was a bit
busy.

La Qua is visually impressive. It's right in the middle of large city
buildings and next to the Tokyo Dome. Thunder Dolphin is an impressive
structure and the entire area is nice and new looking. Our first stop in the
park was in the older section of the park to ride Geo Panic indoor coaster.
My memory of the indoor coasters is a bit jumbled but I recall this ride
having some surprising dips but being rough. It was a Togo after all.

Nearby was Linear Gale, the original Intamin impulse coaster. We had some
trouble actually getting to the entrance. Again, it was a case of something
being easily visible but hard to get to. The launch is humorously slow but
the straight spikes are very fun. In all I really enjoyed the ride despite
the weak launch. To round out the credits on the older side of the park we
rode Spinning Coaster Maihime under the pavilion cover. It's an earlier
generation Maurer Sohne spinning mouse. I can see why they changed to the
banked curves because it was a somewhat brutal ride.

Our last ride was on Thunder Dolphin. We figured we'd wait until after it
was dark to ride (it gets dark at 6:30 PM in Japan). Unfortunately the line
was about 50 minutes long. They ran two trains but since you had to empty
out your pockets and use the storage bins, dispatches took a long time.
Before dispatch the operators make this diving dolphin motion which is
pretty funny.

I had low expectations for this ride but I was actually pleasantly surprised
by it. No, it doesn't have much airtime but it's not all bad. The first drop
is solid and it does have one nice floater hill. But the curves are very
powerful and the views are great. The only weird thing is that there is a
slow, tame trick track at the end of the ride before a large drop directly
into the brakes. This ride could have been so much more. But overall I
thought it was a mostly fun ride.

Unfortunately we didn't have time to ride the Big O Ferris wheel to get some
shots of Thunder Dolphin and La Qua. We had to get going to Sega Joypolis
but first we needed to stop for some food. It just happened that McDonald's
was the place we ran into. It was familiar and quick but ordering wasn't
exactly easier than other places. They have value meals but you still have
to specify everything that you want. I said I wanted a #5 and they initially
rang up five double cheeseburgers with no fries or drink. Yet another
learning experience for me.

Sega Joypolis is located in Daiba which is an island in Tokyo Bay. To get
there we had to use the Yurikamome elevated train which allowed some great
sightseeing even at night. We saw the central Tokyo skyline with the Tokyo
Tower, an Eiffel Tower replica. We proceeded onto the Rainbow Bridge to see
the cool skyline of Daiba including the Palette Town Ferris wheel with its
modern light pattern.

Sega Joypolis is an interesting facility with many simulators and arcade
games. The coaster is the unique Speed Boarder sideways coaster. It has a
slight connection to surfing. The cars run sideways but it spins at certain
points. At one point it goes into a glass enclosed area where people on the
outside boardwalk can watch you ride by. It was an interesting ride but a
bit rough. We made it onto the coaster just after 9 PM. The facility closed
at 10 PM. It was a busy day but we managed to get all of the parks and
coasters in.

--Tim Melago


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