What a great excuse to go to Japan and ride some rails. I was never much interested in Japan until I did a work holiday trip this March, right at the beginning of the cherry blossom season. Its a great country full of very helpful people, very clean place (saw graffiti once) and very safe place with lots of history. Also very easy to get around, particularly by train where most networks have roman signage and English announcements. Get a JR pass (before you leave home) and it is much cheaper. The country moves on rail, bullet trains are so frequent in Tokyo it looks like a scene out of the Blues Brothers. To top it you can by a can of beer with your box lunch at the station kiosk to sip on as you watch the country side zip by. Pat
This is the Railway Festival on the Kurobe Gorge Railway a 762mm (30 inch) gauge special narrow gauge mountain climbing railway. This event was held last Sunday. [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VWbzgi_c4fk"]YouTube - 黒部峡谷鉄é“　å¤ä¼‘ã¿ã€€æ¤œä¿®åº«è¦‹å¦ä¼šã€€2009.8.20[/ame] Railway festivals are common on railways and streetcar lines all across Japan. Numerous demonstrations are given and often miniature trains are set up with rides being given. This shop almost looks like it could fit in somebody's house!!
I lived in Japan 1996-1997 while doing contract work for IBM for the Nagano winter olympic games. It was about a three hour train ride from Tokyo to Nagano via the JR Asama, including about a 10-mile section that required pushers to couple on and get the train over the mountain. That line now has been replaced by a shinkansen (bullet train) which I did not get to ride because it didn't start running until the month after I moved back to the US. The trains are everywhere in Japan and every line seems to have different equipment, both the high speed line and "traditional" lines. Looks very much like the old days in the US when it seemed every track was a different railroad with different passenger equipment. For the climb over the mountain with the pushers, you would go in and out of what seemed like 50 tunnels in the 10-mile stretch. I always remember seeing people all over the place with cameras wondering what they were taking pictures of--now I do the same thing and I know passers by are wondering what the heck I am doing! Jamie
I came across this wet site last weekend. It's called tetsudo.com and tetsudo means railway in Japanese. Photos 鉄é“写真 - 鉄é“コムVideos 鉄é“å‹•ç”» - 鉄é“コムModels 鉄é“æ¨¡åž‹ãƒ»ã‚°ãƒƒã‚ºæƒ…å ± - 鉄é“コムYou can translate the site with Google translate. Text and Web - Google Translate There sub categories like photos, videos, blogs, news and models across the top. On the right side there are sub-categories by railway. Anothre good way to find photos is to search in Google Images by railroad and class once you learn a bit of this information.
Very cool! I've been poking around on a website belonging to Hobby Search in Japan. I buy anime stuff there and they also sell model trains and cars. I might to add some of their stuff to my other N scale trains.
To celebrate the 100th anniversary of the Yamanote line JR East has wrapped an E231 train in chocolate brown. Here's a Japanese news story on this and a couple of videos. A JR Yamanote Line train, its exterior painted to resemble carriages that ran a century ago, pulls in to JR Tokyo Station on Monday. East Japan Railway Co. has put the train, painted in the original chocolate color, into service to mark the 100th anniversary of the naming of the Yamanote Line. It initially ran mainly through Yamanote, or uptown, areas of the capital. The chocolate-colored trains were replaced by brownish-green ones in 1963. The special train, equipped with decorations from the late 1950s and the early 1960s, will run through Dec. 4.(IHT/Asahi: September 8,2009) asahi.com¡ÊÄ«Æü¿·Ê¹¼Ò¡Ë¡§Retro look for Tokyo's loop line - English [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HTqFG_b9NMo&feature=PlayList&p=3C94DB693EB5A1BE"]YouTube - 山手線命å100周年記念車両（鶯谷・西日暮里）[/ame] [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9I1DmliYJt4&feature=PlayList&p=3C94DB693EB5A1BE"]YouTube - 山手線命å１ï¼ï¼å‘¨å¹´è¨˜å¿µã®ãƒãƒ§ã‚³é›»[/ame]
