Edo was the old name of what is now Tokyo, and during what is now known as the Edo Period (1603 – 1868) Edo was one of the grandest and most populated cities on Earth. 250 peaceful years led to great advances in art, literature and science. Today I visited a theme park called Edo Wonderland which attempts to give visitors an idea of what life may have like for residents of Edo during that time.
I arrived right at opening (9 am) and within seconds of entering posed for a photo with ‘Nyan-mage’. From that moment I knew this was going to be more than a Japanese version of ‘Old Sydney Town’!
The park has several areas (ninja, samurai, commercial etc), and does a very good job of hiding the current era via its design and construction. It’s only open during daylight hours so they don’t seem to have to worry about lighting, but toilets and drink machine and even garbages are disguised so as not to be obvious. Also there’s very little English, so I had to use my translator a lot (even to find out which toilet was for men)!
The staff are all dressed in appropriate period clothing, which means there’s lots of ninja and samurai and courtesans manning stalls and handling crowds. Patrons can dress up as well, but I felt paying ¥4500 to wear a Yukata was excessive considering I wear them for free at my hotel 🙂
The chief attractions of the park are the various shows. Above is the ‘magistrates stage’ show which presents a comedic take (including anachronistic elements like YouTube references) of an Edo-era criminal trial.
I also saw a ninja show which was absolutely fantastic! In a dimly lit room we watched a thrilling story of a lone ninja defeating an entire enemy clan. The stage extended into the audience, and I was at the very front and got a perfect view. The acrobatics and sword fighting (including some in the dark with sparks!) was unbelievably well choreographed, and the hero ninja used most of the cool tricks of the trade including flashbangs, blowing blindness powder at the enemy, monkey-like leaping and of course multi-weapon fighting. I loved it so much!
The ‘water magic’ show was three women controlling water at will. This was done via hidden water jets and while initially (deliberately?) cheesy got more clever in a ‘how did they do that?’ way. Again I was in the front row, and it was amusing watching the facial acting of the two attendant girls on the sides.
As good as the ninja show was the big draw at the park was clearly the ‘oiran‘ (courtesan) show. Comedic and slightly dazzling, this featured three beautiful young women in elaborate outfits doing all sorts of intricate dances and interacting with a lucky member of the audience. I was momentarily terrified when the selector spoke to me, but it seems the ability to speak Japanese was a requirement to be chosen for the stage! As beautiful and graceful as she was, the unearthly voice of the oiran (central in the photo) stood out the most for me!
That was about two hours of shows, and I greatly enjoyed them all. Everything was all in Japanese of course, with not even an English guide to indicate proceedings, but this didn’t bother me at all. Though are the biggest draw of the park, there’s still a lot of other things to see.
For instance I baked my own senbei cracker in a mini cooking class! It was delicious 🙂
I also ate a giant chicken skewer, which even though it was dark meat was quite tasty! This was the first time I needed a garbage (to dispose of the stick) and it took me far too long to realize the innocuous wooden crates here and there were actually disguised garbage bins!
I also visited a jigoku (hell) house and saw countless horrors including an animatronic King of the Dead:
A man-eating plant:
And even this poor chap:
I navigated a ‘ninja house’ with weird angles and dimensions. I went through a tricky ‘ninja maze’ that required you to break some fundament maze rules to escape. I even did some archery and scored well enough (3 of 5 arrows hit the target) to win the ‘special’ prize (a clear file).
Her job was to give out bags to put our shoes in before entering one of the theaters. I asked if I could photograph her since I loved her makeup and she was only too happy to let me. After this I found all the employees only too willing to pose for photos, and wish I’d asked someone earlier!
It was extremely hot and most of the park is outdoors, and when I was leaving about five hours later I was quite tired. But I’m very glad I ignored some of the reviews online saying this is a ‘Japanese only’ attraction since I had a great time 🙂
And what did this tired and overheated young man do next? How about immediately entering one of the worlds largest outdoor mazes which was right next door:
The goal here was to reach the towers on all four corners to collect rubber stamps before exiting.
They have a great system where you get a special card and you timestamp it upon entering and exiting and then can upload your time to a website.
The maze was challenging! Not only is it very large (almost 35,000 square feet) it’s also wickedly designed, and you end up criss-crossing your path multiple times since the bridges add a 3D element. About three quarters of my total time were spent obtaining the fourth stamp, and multiple periods of analysis from atop bridges or towers were required to deduce the correct route.
As you can see it took me about 45 minutes, even though I was scampering through like a mad rat. I had foolishly not purchased water before entering so I was also dehydrating with each step (did I mention it was hot today?) and to be honest it’s a miracle I even made it out alive!
But I did, and then on the way back to the hotel in the back of an air conditioned taxi that floated along like a cloud I saw this from the window:
When I excitedly said ‘monkey’ to the driver he laughed and said ‘everywhere’ 🙂
The hotel is very busy today, and in fact the entire town is. The streets are full of people, and it’s clear Saturdays are popular for onsen getaways since my pre-dinner soak was shared with maybe a dozen others. I was wiser today, and only boiled myself lightly before gobbling down the exact same dinner I had last night:
And then – after writing some postcards and watching an insane show on TV where they sunk various foods (eggs, chicken, watermelon etc) to a depth of 100m for a day and then ate them raw – it was time for these:
Hanabi they are called here, ‘fire flower’. Kinugawa would have one last surprise for me: a fireworks show the night before I depart! The launch point was extremely close to my hotel so of course I went to watch.
They were fired from the opposite end of the suspension bride I crossed yesterday. Since we were so close to the launch point, the sound was unreal. One type of shell in particular was almost deafening upon launch, but the boom when the shells exploded above us may have been heard in Tokyo!
It was a lovely show that drew a good crowd, and was a nice end to my sojourn here in Kinugawa. Considering how little I knew about this place before arriving I’m very happy by what I’ve seen and done, and I hope the future of this resort town is bright. As for hot springs in general, I greatly enjoyed visiting one and using the baths. I’d say it’s extremely likely I’ll be going to another one with Kristin one day.
Tomorrow I head back to Tokyo by train. The restful part of this trip has now passed, and the serious shopping, video gaming and UFO catching is about to begin!