| Trip Report: | I got up early on March 21 and left my place before 7:00am. I headed over to central Honshu to reach a milestone.
After riding the Shinkansen and the local trains, I arrived at Hamamatsu and caught a bus to Hamanako Pal Pal. The bus ride lasted 45 minutes. When I go to the park, I discovered that it has been built on two sides of the road. The entrance and parking lot is on one side and the main part of the park with most of the rides is across the street. It appears that the Mega Coaster, which is located on the side by the parking area, may be a parking lot coaster along with a few other rides. My first ride of the day was Mega Coaster. This is an odd Togo coaster that has a couple of inversions. It is a fun coaster. It was my 496th coaster. I found this ride to be very enjoyable and not painful like some steel coasters. Next up was the Mini Coaster. This coaster is sort of a wild mouse like ride with antique auto themed cars much like Panic Drive at Nasu Highland, except this coaster has a different layout. This coaster also appears next to the parking area and may have been built on what was formerly parking spaces. This coaster did nothing for me. After Mini Coaster, it was off to the Batflyer located on the other side of the road. This was my third Batflyer and was just like the other two I have ridden. I enjoyed this one because it was built on a hillside and it gave a great view of the surrounding area. After Batflyer, I took a spin on Jungle Mouse, this is a Japanese made wild mouse that reminds me of the old Lakemont Park Mad Mouse, except this one feels like it is riding on square wheels. Jungle Mouse became my 499th coaster.
I wasn't done yet though. I had to catch a bus back to Hamamatsu station and head out for the big one.
I have been looking at pictures of Lagunasia for a couple of months and thought it would be a neat park to go to. I also was interested in this park because it just opened a brand new coaster less than a week ago. I arrived at Lagunasia at 4:00pm and found a huge retail and entertainment complex called Laguna. Lagunasia is only one part of the complex. The park is themed as a seaport. The first coaster I decided to try was the brand new Pirates' Blast. This ride just opened on March 17, 2007. The ride features trains of two, four-seat cars. The ride is themed as a pirate adventure. There are a lot of dark ride scenes, but the ride is boring and rough. There are three lift hills and on the way up the third one, the train jerked and came to a stop. I thought it may have been part of the experience, but when the ride was over, the train I was in got stuck on the brake run. The ride had developed problems. As it turned out, I was on the last ride of the day and was stranded on the brake run for ten minutes. I was given a pass that would let me bypass the line to any ride of my choosing. Had I not ridden this coaster first, I would not have gotten to ride it at all. Pirates' Blast became my 500th coaster. Next was the Stellar Coaster. This is a family ride that was actually a lot of fun. I used my pass I got from being stranded on the Pirates' Blast to bypass the 40 minute wait at Aqua Wind. The Aqua Wind is a wild mouse type coaster that is easily the best wild mouse type coaster I have ridden. It is smooth and yet very intense. This was my 502nd coaster. I completed the day on the Stellar Coaster and then headed back home. It took all evening to get there as I live so far away. I had finished the day having ridden my 500th coaster which is a huge milestone. I still remember when I had been on less than 25 coasters. |
