Chaos and Kanji is the blog where I write about my adventures through Japan!

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Wednesday, March 3, 2021

Another Coaster for my Collection

Last weekend, I took an overnight trip down to Nagoya to visit my favorite amusement park. I say weekend, though I really visited Nagashima Spaland on Monday, since my days off are Sunday and Monday. It was a really good day: the weather was warm and crowds were light.

Nagashima has all kinds of great rides, and if I lived in Nagoya, I would probably try to visit every week. One of their coasters, Steel Dragon 2000, still holds the record for the longest in the world. It's 97 meters tall, has a 93.5 meter first drop, reaches speeds of 153 km/h, with a nearly 2.5 km-long track. All four of those were records when it was built. It used to have ugly, bulky, uncomfortable trains that looked like this:


After discovering that Do-dodonpa coaster toy, I checked a little online and found this toy. Choro-Coaster is the name it's given, though there was a whole line of Choro vehicles. It was made by Takara, who was also involved in the Do-dodonpa car. This one isn't of as high quality as the Tomica vehicle, but it is 20 years old.

As far as I can tell, this is the only other coaster toy car issued in Japan. I've seen yellow and blue versions, so I'll probably get a blue version to complete the set. And who knows, maybe I'll discover other coaster toys here!

As I mentioned, this is the old train style. The ride got new trains several years ago which are much smoother and more comfortable.

And this trip to Nagoya wasn't just about coasters. I visited two card shops and a card show on Sunday! Once I get everything scanned, I can start sharing my haul.

Until next time...

4 comments:

  1. Neat. Hopefully you can discover a few more. Jealous it is all accessible so easily. Looking forward to seeing what cards you pick up.

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    1. You say "easily", and I guess if I wasn't living in Japan it wouldn't be easy, but it's still surprising how rare some of this stuff that should be common is!

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  2. As a Nagoya resident I have to embarsasingly admit that I've never been to Nagashima Spa Land, though I've been meaning to take my kids there for ages.

    Looking forward to seeing what you picked up at shops here.

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    1. If you like rides, that's the place to go. Not really any theming to be found there, but plenty of things for thrill seekers and little kids. And the Anpanman Museum, if they're into that. There's also a Panda Express in the attached outlet mall!

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