Day 17 - Nagoya

This morning I woke to see it raining outside; however, by the time we all got up and showered, the weather had fined up significantly, and turned out to be a beautiful, albeit cold day. After the morning ritual we headed out for the 500 metre walk to Joshin Subway Station, but not before we briefly stopped at 7-Eleven for some Onigiri (tuna and mayonnaise flavour) as a takeaway breakfast snack.

The walk towards Joshin Subway.

We are beginning to realise that in terms of location, our apartment here is not very well-placed. Just to get ourselves to Nagoya Station (the central hub)  requires catching two separate subway trains. So we caught the two Subway trains to Nagoya Station, then walked to the Aonami Line and caught the train to Kinjo-Futo Station, a little over 20 kilometres distance.

The all-too-common ritual of getting Subway tickets here in Nagoya. 

Transferring to the next Subway at Mananouchi Station.

Arriving at Kinjo-Futo Station.

We then walked a short distance to the SCMAGLEV and Railway Park. Believe it or not, we actually by-passed Japan Legoland to get there.

The SCMaglev and Railway park is a train museum owned by the Central Japan Rail Corporation. It features loads of incredibly well preserved rail vehicles, from very old steam engines through to various iterations of the amazing Shinkansen, and the incredibly futuristic SCMaglev. SCMaglev? Super Conducting Magnetic Levitation (train). More on that later. 

Entry fee was 1000 yen each (AUD $12) each. After we passed the entry gates, we were greeted with the sight of three incredible trains / locomotives.

- A 1949 Class C62 Steam Locomotive. Which set a world speed record for a narrow-gauge steam locomotive in 1954, reaching 129 kph (80 mph).

The C62 Steam Locomotive.

Learning these controls would be an art in and of itself.

- A Class 955 Series 300X Experimental train. An experimental train developed in 1994 capable of speeds in excess of 300 kph (186 mph), used to test technology to be incorporated into future Shinkansen trains.

The Series 300X.

The Driver's Seat.

- The SCMaglev train. Developed in 1995, this train broke the world record for a manned Maglev train in 2003, reaching a phenomenal 581 kph (361 mph) on a test track in Yamanashi, Japan.

The futuristic-looking SCMaglev.

We then continued our tour to be greeted with a giant amphitheatre filled with rail vehicles (trains and carriages). There were so many different varieties, from the very old, right up to a JR Series 700 Shinkansen, the same type that Kyle and I rode to Hamamatsu just a few days ago. Nearly all of the rail vehicles were accessible, and it was amazing just to see the different interior styles and levels of comfort throughout the ages. All of the rail vehicles were immaculately preserved as though they were brand new. There were certainly some outlandish train designers in days gone by, as well as some really cool designers.

The JR Series 700 Shinkansen.

Kyle playing up for the video camera at the Museum.

We were spoilt for choice in looking through the trains, which meant that we spent way more time than we had planned at the SCMaglev and Railway Park. But, it was certainly worth it.

Afterwards, we caught the Aonami line back to Nagoya station and headed into town for lunch and for a brief wander through the streets. 

On the train ride back to Nagoya Station we passed this interesting building, the Mode Gakuen Spiral Towers. The building houses three schools and is 36 stories tall. 

Arriving back at Nagoya Station.

Checking our plans for the rest of the day, we were hit with the realisation that we weren't going to be covering all that we had planned. So we split up, with the two boys wandering through the Nagoya CBD, whilst Maureen and I decided to take a slow walk back to our apartment via the Nagoya TV Tower, Central Park and Nagoya Castle, a distance of around three to four kilometres.

An interesting Restaurant amongst the modern buildings. 

Another interesting building. I love the picture frame windows.

The walk was really nice, albeit cold and windy as we transitioned from the city-scape to the Nagoya Castle surrounds. Central Park was interesting in that it is one city block wide and eight block long. The Nagoya TV Tower is located in the park, and is the oldest TV tower in Japan, having been built in 1954. It closely resembles the Eiffel Tower and stands 180 metres tall. We didn't go up the tower, electing to continue on to Nagoya Castle.

The 180 metre tall Nagoya TV Tower. It's been knocked down a few times in a couple of Godzilla movies.

Walking towards Nagoya Castle.

Entry to the Nagoya Castle precinct costs 500 yen and the gardens around it are beautiful. As with most of the Japanese Castles that we have seen, it has a giant rock-walled moat surrounding it, but interestingly, a lot of the moat has been drained. This is because there is a significant renovation taking place at the Castle with scaffolding set up in the moat. Unfortunately, this meant that we couldn't actually get into the Castle. Interestingly, there were so many Crows flying around the Castle, not sure if that's an omen or not.

The beautiful Autumn leaves are still abundant.

This gives you an idea of the scale of the moat walls. 

Check out those Crows.

The enormous scaffolding around the moat walls.

Nagoya Castle was build between 1610 and 1619, but has had numerous rebuilds and renovations due to all manner of events including earthquakes and US bombing raids in WWII (which pretty much decimated the Castle).

As we weren't able to get into the Castle Maureen and I leisurely walked through the gardens and around the Castle perimeter before walking the remaining kilometre-or-so back to the apartment, where we met up with Sky and Kyle.

Views from our walk home.

It's definitely not a Gogomobile.

For dinner tonight we headed to a great restaurant called Suki and had some great, cheap, delicious meals. I had some beautiful Sashimi with rice and Nori as will as a nice Miso Soup and vegetables. It cost around AUD $10, and they were certainly generous with the Sashimi.

So that's it for another day, our final full day in Nagoya, before we head off to Tokyo tomorrow morning. We will have a few hours to kill when we arrive in Tokyo as we can't check in to our apartment until 1500h. The best thing though is that we will be in the same place until Christmas Day, so no more frequent moves.