S15_SAM
NisSam
- Joined
- 21 February 2011
- Messages
- 1,915
- Reaction score
- 0
- Points
- 0
- Location
- Chippenham, wiltshire
- Country
-
Well Japan, the holy land of JDM, temples, touge and thankyou's. As some of you may know I recently went to Japan on my honeymoon here's my story.....
I cannot describe how incredible Japan is. Its one of those places you have to visit to appreciate. I can tell you 10 times over how polite the people are, but you will still be shocked how much they bow and say thankyou or as its pronounced "arregato gezimas". As a westerner their customs and mannerisms were slight uncomfortable to start with because they are so helpful and tentative to your needs that it almost feels like they are taking too long/faffing for almost everything. So you have to acclimatise and become more patient, and take on their mannerism's. I suppose the best thing to do is just be extremely respectful of everything and everyone. Simples!
My trip consisted of: 2 nights in ginza tokyo, 2 nights Disneyland (for the mrs), 1 night in utsunomiya (near nikko race circuit), 2 nights in Gotemba (near fuji speedway and Hakone), 3 nights in Kyoto, then 2 more in Shinjuku Tokyo. It was a real whistle stop tour of Japan but I know what I will be doing next time! Kyoto was good but the temples get boring fast, so either do it before you go to tokyo otherwise kyoto will be boring! There are temples in tokyo!
So the JDM/car stuff, Japanese people on the whole don't know that their JDM car culture is famous outside the country. Import to them is German vehicles!
I got to hang out with my 2 Japanese friends for 3 days and they were shocked how much I knew about Japanese cars and the race tracks etc. I visited Tsukuba circuit, Nikko circuit, and Fuji speedway and we were the only foreigners around, you could tell they don't see many gaijin faces at the tracks as we were being stared at alot!
(Tsukuba)
(S15 doing gymkhana at Tsukuba)
(Nikko)
(Fuji speedway)
Being in and around tokyo is awesome but its not filled with skylines and silvia's everywhere, its Kei cars and boxy Hondas and Nissans. So if your looking for car's then stay in yokohama and rent a car and drive to the Parking Area's and you'll see small amounts of real JDM metal. Saying that you so see abit of cool stuff, I saw a jgtc style NSX in the streets and a few rx7's scoobies evo's and skylines.
Its not until you reach the mountains or rural areas that you see "sports cars" (what Japanese guys call performance cars) in alot of parking area's and in driveways. Even still all the classic JDM stuff is old now and costs alot to run. But you see alot of newer toyota and 350/70's about in the PA's.
Tokyo is an awesome city, visit Shinjuku for crazy bars, love hotels and karaoke, visit akihabara for electronics ****, mental manga shops full of porn mags, videos and manga figurines. Ginza is very posh and upmarket, a great place to base yourself from as The tube is so easy to use, buy an all day ticket for £7 and you can go everywhere in tokyo.
There is a super autobacs in tokyo in shinonome bay. I was expecting great things from autobacs but they only really cater for new cars (brz gt86 Prius) so if your looking for car parts then up garage is the best way. They sell second hand stuff. But they are located miles out of town so you will need a car to access them.
I would say don't worry about trying to find car shops or garages as they are spread out alot and often just small garages with car parks full of old drift bangers. I would spend your time visiting tracks and driving around mt Fuji! It really is incredible. I would time your trip with some car events at the tracks, I visited Tsukuba circuit where there was a bike race meeting on the main track and just behind the main straight they have a large parking lot where there was gymkhana going on. Saw a S15 having a go, see pic above and I bought a few T-shirts from the shop and lots of stickers! This is also where I luckily came across Koguchi power shop on the way to Tsukuba, who are D1 drift legends I met koguchi-San and his GF, neither spoke any English! But I got some pics and some stickers!
then as we were leaving this rad S15 was just pulling in
To get around I hired a brand new corolla from toyota rent a car, booked it over the phone. It was £200 for 4 days. I did alot of research before I went and found where I was going to pick it up from and where to drop it back near a shinkansen train station (odawara, 30mins from
Hakone) which made the booking alot easier!
There are tolls on the main highways and you need to go to the booth with the green sign over it, the others are prepaid cards only! Then the normal roads are very easy, speed limits are very low but I found the cars travel about 20km over them.
I was so lucky to have my Japanese friends (shingo and minoru) as they hooked me up massively and I got to drive a few track day sessions at nikko circuit! In a friend of a friends 250bhp Nissan PS13!! He had never met me before, but this shows the kindness and respect the Japanese people have and he let me give it everything round a track! My good friend had his R32 GTR out on track too and when I wasn't driving I was in as a passenger in his 500hp beast!
(me about to go out on track)
The track day was split into 50% time attack sessions and 50% drifting sessions!
(video of some of the japs crazy drifting)
It was unreal to be watching drifting in Japan at nikko circuit which I have watched so many times on D1 dvd's. and unreal to be able to drive it! I was so lucky! Perfect weather, amazing friends and driving on a true JDM track!I thought it couldn't get any better but it.........
I cannot describe how incredible Japan is. Its one of those places you have to visit to appreciate. I can tell you 10 times over how polite the people are, but you will still be shocked how much they bow and say thankyou or as its pronounced "arregato gezimas". As a westerner their customs and mannerisms were slight uncomfortable to start with because they are so helpful and tentative to your needs that it almost feels like they are taking too long/faffing for almost everything. So you have to acclimatise and become more patient, and take on their mannerism's. I suppose the best thing to do is just be extremely respectful of everything and everyone. Simples!
My trip consisted of: 2 nights in ginza tokyo, 2 nights Disneyland (for the mrs), 1 night in utsunomiya (near nikko race circuit), 2 nights in Gotemba (near fuji speedway and Hakone), 3 nights in Kyoto, then 2 more in Shinjuku Tokyo. It was a real whistle stop tour of Japan but I know what I will be doing next time! Kyoto was good but the temples get boring fast, so either do it before you go to tokyo otherwise kyoto will be boring! There are temples in tokyo!
So the JDM/car stuff, Japanese people on the whole don't know that their JDM car culture is famous outside the country. Import to them is German vehicles!
I got to hang out with my 2 Japanese friends for 3 days and they were shocked how much I knew about Japanese cars and the race tracks etc. I visited Tsukuba circuit, Nikko circuit, and Fuji speedway and we were the only foreigners around, you could tell they don't see many gaijin faces at the tracks as we were being stared at alot!
(Tsukuba)
(S15 doing gymkhana at Tsukuba)
(Nikko)
(Fuji speedway)
Being in and around tokyo is awesome but its not filled with skylines and silvia's everywhere, its Kei cars and boxy Hondas and Nissans. So if your looking for car's then stay in yokohama and rent a car and drive to the Parking Area's and you'll see small amounts of real JDM metal. Saying that you so see abit of cool stuff, I saw a jgtc style NSX in the streets and a few rx7's scoobies evo's and skylines.
Its not until you reach the mountains or rural areas that you see "sports cars" (what Japanese guys call performance cars) in alot of parking area's and in driveways. Even still all the classic JDM stuff is old now and costs alot to run. But you see alot of newer toyota and 350/70's about in the PA's.
Tokyo is an awesome city, visit Shinjuku for crazy bars, love hotels and karaoke, visit akihabara for electronics ****, mental manga shops full of porn mags, videos and manga figurines. Ginza is very posh and upmarket, a great place to base yourself from as The tube is so easy to use, buy an all day ticket for £7 and you can go everywhere in tokyo.
There is a super autobacs in tokyo in shinonome bay. I was expecting great things from autobacs but they only really cater for new cars (brz gt86 Prius) so if your looking for car parts then up garage is the best way. They sell second hand stuff. But they are located miles out of town so you will need a car to access them.
I would say don't worry about trying to find car shops or garages as they are spread out alot and often just small garages with car parks full of old drift bangers. I would spend your time visiting tracks and driving around mt Fuji! It really is incredible. I would time your trip with some car events at the tracks, I visited Tsukuba circuit where there was a bike race meeting on the main track and just behind the main straight they have a large parking lot where there was gymkhana going on. Saw a S15 having a go, see pic above and I bought a few T-shirts from the shop and lots of stickers! This is also where I luckily came across Koguchi power shop on the way to Tsukuba, who are D1 drift legends I met koguchi-San and his GF, neither spoke any English! But I got some pics and some stickers!
then as we were leaving this rad S15 was just pulling in
To get around I hired a brand new corolla from toyota rent a car, booked it over the phone. It was £200 for 4 days. I did alot of research before I went and found where I was going to pick it up from and where to drop it back near a shinkansen train station (odawara, 30mins from
Hakone) which made the booking alot easier!
There are tolls on the main highways and you need to go to the booth with the green sign over it, the others are prepaid cards only! Then the normal roads are very easy, speed limits are very low but I found the cars travel about 20km over them.
I was so lucky to have my Japanese friends (shingo and minoru) as they hooked me up massively and I got to drive a few track day sessions at nikko circuit! In a friend of a friends 250bhp Nissan PS13!! He had never met me before, but this shows the kindness and respect the Japanese people have and he let me give it everything round a track! My good friend had his R32 GTR out on track too and when I wasn't driving I was in as a passenger in his 500hp beast!
(me about to go out on track)
The track day was split into 50% time attack sessions and 50% drifting sessions!
(video of some of the japs crazy drifting)
