robbalvey Posted June 24, 2015 Author Share Posted June 24, 2015 (edited) We are live tweeting about our adventures in Japan so follow along on Twitter @themeparkreview - Our next stop was Mitsui Greenland! This is a BIG update, so I'm going to let the photos do most of the talking, but I will say that this is one of my favorite "amusement parks" in Japan. Such a great place with SO MANY rides, and a huge variety as well! The park is an interesting setup as most of the rides are owned by different people. While they have a "pay one price" option, your wristband is scanned at each ride and I'm assuming that the operators get a small cut of each time someone rides or takes part in their attraction, as the operators are always trying to come up with unique ways to get people on their rides, and also ride multiple times. Onto some photos! Traveling by train is the BEST way to see Japan! It's amazing how awesome their rail system is! Today, Russell is playing the part of "old man with the cane." I love these signs on the trains! So amazing! From the train station to the park, we travel by taxi Amazing Race style! Arriving at the park, the GIANT Ferris Wheel dwarfs everything else at the park! Yay! TPR welcome sign! Time to hang out and have some fun! I love the look of this park! They have such a random collection of coasters and flat rides here. Of course, Joe goes for the powered kiddie first! Sadly, the Vekoma suspended coaster was closed today, but that's ok, there is plenty of other rides to keep us busy! The dual-track sit down/stand up Togo is actually a lot of fun! And they have a ban on selfie sticks at this park, which we fully endorse! Here's the stand-up train! Here's the sit-down. Oddly enough, this ride is actually REALLY GOOD! Unlike the Togo installations in the US, most of the ones in Japan are fairly smooth and very rideable! I love how Mitsui includes some games like archery into their pay-one-price ticket! Yes, they hand you a bow and arrow! And you shoot! Not many of us are good at it, but when a park hands you a bow and arrow...for free...you don't complain! Yay for Sphinxy: The Ride! In honor of Jurassic World, we are going to get eaten by Gao the dinosaur! Gao is one of those funky Japanese "jet coasters" that's actually pretty damn big, very long, but sort of doesn't do much. They are all fun, but feel like a "huge mine train." And of course on Gao, you get eaten by the dinosaur! The theming is great on this ride! And some of the track sections sure are... "funky!" Gotta love the front of the train with the dinosaur driving it. And yes, the headlights actually work at night! Next up...spinning! Jack and family managed to spin a LOT! Russell hanging out with some of his favorite old buddies. At the top of the hill was a really whacked out haunted walk through and the alpine slide. After walking up what seemed like the amount of stairs that would take you to space, you see cute and funny scenes like this. And some seriously creepy stuff that will haunt your nightmares for quite some time. The girls decided not to be traumatized by the 74 thousand stairs and creepy images, so they did the kiddie swings instead. Goal this year...don't send anyone to the hospital! Already we are doing MUCH better than TPDave and Scottish Steve did on our last visit! "Hey look! All my skin is still in tact!" This is what Scottish Steve and TPDave DIDN'T do on our last visit! No one fell off the sled... ...No one left pieces of human flesh on the track! Success!! "No pictures, no pictures! Please contact my agent!" All that's left of the old shuttle loop is one loop....still kind of want to ride it! lol BEST part of this park? Japanese McDonalds! Best part of Japanese McDonalds? Shaka Shaka Chicken! Yes! It's still here! This is seriously a highlight! Not sure why this never made it to the USA, but a bastardized version did make it to Europe. There's the chicken in the bag. You pour in the awesome sauce and you shake the crap out of it! And Ta-Da! You have one of the most glorious, blazing hot fast food items ever created! Yum! I don't know what exactly is going on here... Time for some more random dark rides and things... This one is a shooter with lots of funky Japanesey stuff. This one is a haunted house ride where you wear headphones... The audio portion is actually really well done! And you see screwed up stuff like this... ...and this! Next up was the candle walk-through where you hold a candle and try to keep it as still as possible while things are jumping out at you. The more still you keep your candle, the more points you get! Indoor coaster with random space theming! Yay! Tons of flat at this park. This Starflyer was AWESOME! Got video of it...will post soon! They also had one of these awesome Togo Paratrooper/Enterprise rides. They lock the seats in place while they swing and you get a really bizarre ride out of it! Yes! Chair lift of death! One tiny seat - no restraints! This translates into "Sit your ass down...don't fall. Thank you!" And yet another park where they just hand you an animal to hang out with! While this guinea pig was not presented in a basket, it was still cool! They have dogs in their petting zoo! Yes! Most Japanese don't have bigger pets because of smaller living areas. So they are in the petting zoo! Still one of my favorite coaster views - Sitting behind a dinosaurs butt while ascending towards and GIANT Ferris Wheel! Really do love the theming of this ride! Weird how the dinosaur is going to get eaten by the dinosaur! Such cannibalistic creatures! A little more of the layout of Gao. Jack doesn't like Ferris Wheels...at ALL...so we are taking him on as many as we can this trip, because we are really nice like that. The view of the park is fantastic! Obviously, as you can see, Jack agrees! lol Another view of Gao.... And yes, they have an Ultra Twister here...and we will get to that in a moment... This Ferris Wheel is about 350 feet all...and it's AWESOME! Here's the Mitsui hotel...looks kind of cool. Jack did it! 350 feet up, all the way around! And he's ready for his next giant wheel! Ice House credit! Taking a ride on the Go Karts. There seriously are just so many rides in this park! Spent the whole day having fun here. The moms kicked butt in the "maze" We've now seen these at a couple of parks and they seem to be fairly new in Japan. They are awesome with all the different challenges you have to do! The girls were the losers! lol Ok, so the Ultra Twister at Mitsui has this awesome thing you can do.... ...if you ride the coaster ten times in a row, they give you a stick to personalize to put on the wall! It's a clever way to get more riders on the coaster! This one is very smooth and a LOT of fun! Some people do group sticks to theme them! We see you Funashi! I really love these coasters! It's a shame only one made it to the USA, and it wasn't really taken that good care of. I rode ten times and I got my stick! Here's my name in English! And here it is in Japanese! lol Together, we rode the Ultra Twister 50 times! lol Our group sticks to be displayed on the wall! We also did it with another Japanese group! They were awesome to hang out with! In case you wondered what to do in the bathroom... Oh, yeah, they have an SLC here too! Such an awesome park! One of my favorites in Japan! Here you can see the map of the park...so many rides!!! Heading back home now... We love seeing Japan by train! Tonights first dinner...awesome Indian food! Even the girls loved all the breads! Second dinner... Yakitori! WANT!! MORE!!! OMG CHEESE WRAPPED IN BACON!!! CANNOT GET ENOUGH OF THIS!!! And we will end this update with some Japanese porn, because...why not? Edited June 24, 2015 by robbalvey Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nrthwnd Posted June 24, 2015 Share Posted June 24, 2015 Uh, the cheese wrapped in bacon, sort of of made me forget everything else. It's all yummy. Great TR of Mitsui, Robb. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guy T. Koepp Posted June 24, 2015 Share Posted June 24, 2015 Cheese wrapped in bacon... ...and porn! I love this country! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cfc Posted June 24, 2015 Share Posted June 24, 2015 Aw, I miss Mitsui Greenland. Really liked that place back in 2007 (especially the dark rides and walk-through haunted houses). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
markysharky17 Posted June 24, 2015 Share Posted June 24, 2015 Is anyone a wear of any other Togo paratrooper ride? Like possibly in the U.S. ? It looks amazing! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
robbalvey Posted June 24, 2015 Author Share Posted June 24, 2015 Is anyone a wear of any other Togo paratrooper ride? Like possibly in the U.S. ? It looks amazing! I have never seen one in the USA. I think I've seen a knock-off or two in China, but I honestly don't remember which parks. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hilltopper39 Posted June 24, 2015 Share Posted June 24, 2015 This park is really weird. It's like there are a ton of good coasters but not really any great coasters, which is okay. Is Mitsui Greenland one of those Japanese park that's a Ski Resort in the winter or am I thinking of somewhere else? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
robbalvey Posted June 24, 2015 Author Share Posted June 24, 2015 This park is really weird. It's like there are a ton of good coasters but not really any great coasters, which is okay. Is Mitsui Greenland one of those Japanese park that's a Ski Resort in the winter or am I thinking of somewhere else? You're thinking of Rustusu in Northern Japan. And yeah, your assessment is about right. But the one thing about Japan is that there aren't a lot of "GREAT" coasters there, but there are a lot of really good ones, and almost more importantly, really unique ones. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Garet Posted June 24, 2015 Share Posted June 24, 2015 Why is it only Japan gets all the cool flavors of chocolate, weird soda flavors and cool burger king and Mcdonald's stuff. I'd always hoped being in Korea next door, we'd see some of it but it always stays firmly in Japan. Oh well on the plus side, living here means Tokyo is only 2 hours away and Osaka even less. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nwstone Posted June 24, 2015 Share Posted June 24, 2015 I love how Robb was like "Oh yeah there's also an SLC here" Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
soilooklikemanson Posted June 24, 2015 Share Posted June 24, 2015 Just so much WOW! Awesome. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TPDave Posted June 24, 2015 Share Posted June 24, 2015 Brakes are for wimps So jealous, it looks like you all had a great day!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hilltopper39 Posted June 24, 2015 Share Posted June 24, 2015 This park is really weird. It's like there are a ton of good coasters but not really any great coasters, which is okay. Is Mitsui Greenland one of those Japanese park that's a Ski Resort in the winter or am I thinking of somewhere else? You're thinking of Rustusu in Northern Japan. And yeah, your assessment is about right. But the one thing about Japan is that there aren't a lot of "GREAT" coasters there, but there are a lot of really good ones, and almost more importantly, really unique ones. Ah, Rustusu was the one I was thinking of. It looks like there's a gigantic golf resort right next to Mitsui Greenland that looks HUGE, has to be 3 or 4 18 hole courses. I knew there was something "green" around the Greenland park! Golf and weird coasters in Japan, that's right up my alley! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HARLEYGUYJB Posted June 24, 2015 Share Posted June 24, 2015 I love seeing all of these photos! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RoCo Posted June 24, 2015 Share Posted June 24, 2015 So much to love in these reports, so much. What the hell is up with that tiny chair lift deal? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gisco Posted June 24, 2015 Share Posted June 24, 2015 I remember in 2007 it was super hot there. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rcjp Posted June 24, 2015 Share Posted June 24, 2015 Looks like you're having an awesome time! Also interesting how they find ways for people to ride "their" rides a lot. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TBpony414 Posted June 25, 2015 Share Posted June 25, 2015 I'm shocked how big the most recent park is! They have a ton of cool rides and fun activities to do and the random chairlift reminds me of one they have on the island of Capri to get to the top. Definitely going to look up the skin coaster hospital incident from the last trip!! Not sure what year it was but there are search engines on this site for a reason Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Garet Posted June 25, 2015 Share Posted June 25, 2015 But the one thing about Japan is that there aren't a lot of "GREAT" coasters there, but there are a lot of really good ones, and almost more importantly, really unique ones. Which is much better to me to constantly see new roller-coasters that are good and unique and have many of them, than go to a place that has just a few great roller-coasters and then sits the same for the next 10 years. I see new stuff in Japan each year that makes me want to go back before I've even left from my current trip. I have lived in Korea for 6 years and there's a lot of parks I still haven't returned to. I mean we have T Express and Atlantis here..... two really great coasters and that's it (and even Atlantis has turned off the water that makes it unique) except maybe the arrow triple looper and Korea silver bullet in the good category. You look at Japan and you see new things almost every year popping up and then some of the park in Korea sit almost the same from when they opened. The only new coasters we've seen coming in the last 10 years are for new parks like Legoland or children's grand park and are aimed at children (the latter having removed their thrill rides to make way for family rides). The boomerang here is SBNO and there's now reports the government is to close down Seoul Land (so minus 4 more coasters if it happens.) to make way for a people powered park similar to one in Europe. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Garet Posted June 25, 2015 Share Posted June 25, 2015 Been looking at the TPR twitter, that BTTF shirt from uniqlo is always out of stock here in Korea, even online I can always find one with the logo but the delorean one has been harder to track down, might have to trek into Seoul this weekend. Interesting seeing the tweets from the Fuji-Q people. I feel like Fuji-Q has such a bad reputation that people always seem to have a good first trip because their targets and expectations are so low that when the weather works out people enjoy it. I feel like it's a park where you get diminishing returns with each trip as you begin to notice more and more things. On my first trip, I stayed in the same place and watched the weather forecast like a hawk and then had the hotel reserve the bus for me the night before when weather looked good (so basically my whole trip was working around Fuji Q.) On the 1st trip, I took my camera so was taking it really slow and just aimed for the big 4 coasters and came away pleasantly surprised. This was even the day an ATM ate my credit card so I had to tackle the park without any fast passes. It probably helped this was during the year when Everland was running half day schedules on rides so I was used to bad operations. Then my second trip without a camera (again working my whole trip around the weather for that park) I thought i'd get more done....and I didn't. I missed out on the fast-pass for the haunted house when I got off my first ride, saw the fast pass place wasn't open and went to grab another coaster and got caught in a way longer queue than I anticipated. I also found I noticed way more things now I had been before like: second cars being removed in the afternoon resulting in 2 hour lines even though it looked much shorter, rapids only taking 2 people a boat, the locker systems resulting in stupidly slow loading when someone forgets to remove their watch or phone etc.... I bring it up because I may be making another trip to Japan but it'll be a much shorter one so I may even have to skip Tokyo Disney than try and cram one park into one day (and nothing will ever top the completely empty snow filled 1st trip) wait it out for all the new additions coming to TDS and make my next trip after that just all Disney. I'm thinking of going place to place to parks I've missed before due to time. Maybe revisit Universal and then pick up Nagashima to finally try a 1st gen freefall and a ultra twister as well as maybe Parque Espana and ending in Tokyo for Thunder Dolphin and Joyopolis that were both closed on my last trip. I'm thinking that I could do Fuji on the way across, since I really do enjoy Dodonpa's launch and I've still yet to try the famous hospital, but this time I won't be staying in one place so I'll be at the mercy of the weather and it seems people enjoy the park less with each trip they make and even my 2nd trip went from good to bearable..... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
robbalvey Posted June 25, 2015 Author Share Posted June 25, 2015 (edited) Interesting seeing the tweets from the Fuji-Q people. I feel like Fuji-Q has such a bad reputation that people always seem to have a good first trip because their targets and expectations are so low that when the weather works out people enjoy it. The group that went had the best possible conditions for the park - Weather was good and the crowds were light. We also made sure we gave the group as much instruction and direction as possible on how to navigate the park to ensure they stayed ahead of the crowds. Still the worst park in the world no matter what any "first timers" might have to say that got lucky enough to have a tolerable visit in decent weather. In a way, it sort of bums me out when people don't get the full "Fuji-Q experience", but then again, I would only want to wish that on people we no longer allow to travel with us. This is my favorite image from one of our many awful visits to Fuji-Q which really sums up my thoughts on the place.... Edited June 25, 2015 by robbalvey Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jew Posted June 25, 2015 Share Posted June 25, 2015 Fuji-Q is terrible. I don't have all the credits because the lines move so painfully slow if/when the rides are open. Nor have I been able to do the allegedly awesome haunt walkthrough. Dodonpa has the most insane moment of airtime I've ever experienced though. And the most intense launch. Bandit is also decent. But that is about all you will be able to ride in one day at that park.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cfc Posted June 25, 2015 Share Posted June 25, 2015 Fuji-Q is terrible. I don't have all the credits because the lines move so painfully slow if/when the rides are open. Nor have I been able to do the allegedly awesome haunt walkthrough. Dodonpa has the most insane moment of airtime I've ever experienced though. And the most intense launch. Bandit is also decent. But that is about all you will be able to ride in one day at that park.... The Haunted Hospital has good, creepy atmosphere, but not much in the way of scares until the very end (when scareactors chase people out the door); at least that's the way it was when I did it (maybe they have more going on nearer to Halloween). Hotel Gasten at Liseberg is much better. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Philrad71 Posted June 25, 2015 Share Posted June 25, 2015 . Now these are selfie sticks....love it!!! LOL! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bombora Posted June 26, 2015 Share Posted June 26, 2015 Funny how bad it sucks, but TPR still goes back for more. I like Fuji Q. Been twice and had a great time twice. Only problem is Dodonpa was closed twice. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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