Inside Desolate Japanese Town - You Won't Believe What I Found... | Bike Touring Japan #9
Japan can be one of the most simple, slow, and sometimes boring countries you've ever been to. Just wanted to stop and talk to somebody because it is quiet here, not a soul. At the same time, Japan can be one of the most beautiful, fascinating, and bizarre countries as well. I don't think I've been to any other country in the world that has so many buildings that have just been completely abandoned and walked away from.
Wow, look at that car. That is an oldie. Hey, birdie. You just gotta know where to look. Or like in this video, get lucky.
You got hotels that will only take you if you have a dog. That's the weirdest thing I've ever heard. I'm cycling from Guma to Kyushu in search for the beautiful and bizarre that I know Japan has to offer. And in this video, I found plenty of it. Good morning from the Japan Sea. Last night I was going along this path right here all the way down.
It just goes on forever. And I think it continues behind me. We're a long ways too. I just want to point out real quick, this beach over here looks pretty nasty. It's pretty polluted.
A lot of trash washed up on the shore. I always point out things like this in Indonesia. Indonesia is such a beautiful country, but there's so much trash everywhere. I gotta do it here too.
I always got under my skin a little bit when I was visiting Indonesia and the beach is there. A lot of people, they go there and they eat their snacks or whatever. And then they just leave them and walk away.
I don't know. I got a lot of Indonesian subscribers and followers. Like what is the mindset behind that? Anyways, it's a little side tangent. Just sitting up, just packing up my stuff and Mike comes over here and says hello. He's traveling from Kyushu to Aomori, right? Aomori, yeah.
Wow, that's a long way. I'm just admiring his setup here. He's got a trek. Grab a bike. Yeah, checkpoint, grab the bikes.
You got a good setup. What I really like is his surround sound speaker system that he has going on on his handlebars. Safe travels, Mike.
Okay, thank you. And just like that, we are good to go. I love my bike, it looks good.
Maybe there's an Air Force base or something around here, but you can hear a jet, that's for sure. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. You got me? Got me rolling. Saying a lot of trash.
He's catching, that's about it. Good luck. So those would be Japanese fighter jets.
And so, I don't know if you guys know much about the Japanese self -defense force, that's what they call it here, the Japanese self -defense force, but it's basically, it's a military. Japan, I read recently, increased the budget for the self -defense force, the military, and it's like 2% GDP. And so, the Constitution for Japan was written really quickly, and it took like a week. They brought in some constitutional scholars, and Americans wrote the Japanese Constitution, and I don't forget which article it is, but there's an article in there that says, Japan could never wage war again. And so, at the beginning, it started off as just like a military, not a military, but like a police force, and then the Korean War happened, and you know, Japan basically was like, hey, we want to be able to defend ourselves. And so, the self -defense force, defense force was created, but Japan being one of America's most trusted and relied upon allies and as big of a military country as the US is, it's not surprising that Japan's military has grown to what it is today, especially considering where it is on this side of the world.
Yeah, let's call it what it is, it's a military. I don't think I've been to any other country in the world that has so many buildings that have just been completely abandoned and walked away from. Japan has so many abandoned hotels, ski resorts, pachinko parlors, houses, restaurants, all over the country and a lot of times They're just left as is. I'm sure this hotel still has futons in the closet, tables and bedding in the rooms. There's probably soap and shampoo, like just still chillin' in the shower room, but it's eerie. Be the sauna room.
Let's see here, just like the ones that I've been at. Come in here, you put your clothes in there. Okay, I guess it's locked up pretty good. We're not gonna be able to get in there, but.
So one of the big reasons you have so many places like this in Japan is that at the beginning of the 1990s, the bubble economy popped. In the 1980s, especially from the years, from 1985 to 1990, Japan's economy was booming. Everybody was flush with cash. Banks were lending out money. From what I read, like really, really easily, people were buying up land. The land value was just skyrocketing.
I read that the Imperial Palace land that it sits on in Tokyo was worth more than California. The whole state of California, the Imperial Palace land was worth more than that. And then, well, some people got things wrong and the economy popped, or the bubble popped, and I read something like $16 trillion were lost, like in three months in Japan. And so it's something that Japan has never quite fully recovered from. Like the economy, the stock market from the 1990s. now has more or less been the same just kind of stagnant and so and even now the I don't know what's going on with economy the the yen is really really weak now which is good for me because I'm getting paid in US dollars but I can I can tell you know some of my friends here some of my friends here that are working you know they're getting paid in the end they're definitely feeling it but you know I've talked to some of the older people who lived here in the bubble economy and there's like it was a wild time like people just had cash and the people were on felt like they're on top of the world and investing and one of the craziest stories I've heard is from one of my sweet students rest in peace I had a sweet old lady that I taught English to and she was telling me stories about it they had people were doing Weird things that I would never even think of they would invest in Country Club memberships.
And so that was a thing almost like like stocks, you know, they would buy a membership to there was a membership in in Guma to a Kageyama country club and They bought it for thousands of dollars the the value of that membership rose to over a hundred thousand dollars or more The bubble economy it imploded it crashed They just held on to those memberships and that eventually Decades later they still had it and they ended up selling it for like five hundred dollars if that when It was worth over like a hundred grand. I'm not even kidding They're crazy numbers and crazy things like that that happened here in Japan during the bubble economy. Just look it up you know if you can If you're lucky enough to talk to older people who lived through it Like you'll hear some crazy stories like that. Just like hundreds of thousands of dollars just boom gone And so I have a I know a Japanese website that lists a lot of haikos a lot of ruins here in Japan And so I just like to check it out from time to time and see if there's any on the way You know on the route that I'm on and sure enough in this small little little town has a little lake right here There was like seven or eight listed hotels on the the website, so I just wanted to come through here and check it out It's kind of crazy the ones that are open. They're just like desolate. There's no is this open.
Yeah, there's people in there There's people in there Let's uh let's see if we can go have a look at at a room and just see what it looks like in there before maybe They have to shut down. I mean this one right here is closed This is the Wan Wan resort how cute it's the the dog resort Wan Wan is another name for dog it's really nice it's really nice there is not a soul in here and a nice little souvenir and get me in that gift shop a little open bar here maybe drink some sake or something anybody working here okay this is where you can come and bring your pet and play in here huh interesting so it really is the dog resort I don't think that concept is working out for him very well this is weird I still haven't seen anybody in this entire place check it out They really went big on the old dog resort thing, didn't they? There's another park right here. The men's awesome. It's pretty nice.
You come out here, you've got a nice bath right here, and you've got a nice lookout. Oh, here's a little tree collage of all the dogs that have stayed here at the Wan Wan Resort. You've got Mary. Who's that? Loco. Oh my gosh. What is this place? Hello.
Hello. Hello. Hello. Hello. Hello.
What do you think? Oh what do you think? So we were asking for a man over here. VOCO. Okay so we asked for a man over here, routine in order of man over here. So got him over here? Knock out both the generating points here. What's your name? I'm Jonjuu. Jonjuu.
I'm Jonjuu. Good. Thank you. I'll be back later.
Interesting. Thank you. Bye. What a weird concept. You won't take my money. You won't let me stay here if I don't have a dog.
Really? There is nobody in here. Come on. Bye. That is bizarre. That is bizarre.
That is just the weirdest business strategy ever. What if you like dogs? You don't want to go to a place and you just want to like be around dogs that you know Maybe not they're not your own obviously, but you know People are nice. I'll let you pet their dog or whatever. I don't know just weird So I found some other people in the town They're actually making a video as well a little more professional. I'd say they they're working for NHK but they're doing a story I think on this small town and the Lake and the onsen and whatnot and so they're gonna film this little area right here And it just says I'm a little signpost right there that this is where all the hot spring water comes from They're working with some professional equipment here It's a beautiful place look at this you got a little pond right in the middle of town uh you got a little foot bath that i'm about to enjoy but you got hotels that will only take you if you have a dog it's the weirdest thing i've ever heard okay i'm not sure what this big thing is a huge well i don't know but it's filled with all this hot water right here oh hi uh so a bus just rolled up and i don't know a good 15 to 20 old ladies hopped out coming to get their feet wet sweet old ladies all right let's uh so from here i actually uh got a reply back from uh the the warm showers lady miho i think is her name and so if she gave me the thumbs up and so we're going to Fukui got a place to stay I'm excited let's go meet my host family for tonight let's do it now this is just bizarre I did not expect to see this I saw this huge cannon statue from the side of the road and I entered from over there and this looks like a war zone oh my gosh crazy that's what I saw from the side of the road I did not expect to see this let's go have a look Wow look at that car that is an oldie I know what it is The GS volume 2, I don't even know where to begin, how did this car end up here in that position.
These look like rooms you would have been able to stay in, there's a refrigerator right here. The Tommy looks like it's in pretty good condition still. This must have been the lobby of the hotel I'm guessing. There's a mattress right here, massive banquet hall, stage over here, I'm sure they had some wild events here at one point. This is what I mean, people just walk away from all this stuff, boxes full of dishes, plates, furniture, just walk away, and then people come in here and tag it, wow, look at this bathroom, this onsen in here.
Hey birdie, this would have been so nice. Got different, different bass over here. I got a huge one back there.
I think the men or women's probably split up right here. Crazy. I mean, Asana, perfect. This is really strange to be here, but I'm sure all the stuff in here has been moved around and thrown all over the place. But.
Okay, so over here just looks like rooms that you could sleep probably 15 people in here if you wanted to There's a roll out all the futons Yeah I didn't think this was I thought this was just a regular statue. I Did not know it was gonna be closed and gutted and abandoned like this Perfectly good little saucer here Which these offerings here look pretty fresh and the way they're laid out, you know all organized and in place it looks like Somebody still comes up here and just like gives little offerings to the gods interesting I mean I've never seen a shrine or a temple like this that was That that also doubled as a as a hotel another strange concept This reminds me of Was that place in Sotabaya there was that half abandoned half Half open amusement park in Sotabaya and they had a lot of places like this That is just like a huge gold gong, and there's a, is that what I'm saying, that sound, gong that just sounds like a weird word, uh, that is, I'm kind of speechless, that is huge, and I wonder if that would swing and hit it. But this is, luckily it's still in really good condition. Nobody's coming here and vandalizing it. So bizarre.
I'm not the only one that's interested in it. then we have some uh some oldies that want to go check out the haikyo too it's bizarre this goes on forever and ever it seems like look at that got the train in the background a sea of wheat pretty beautiful so this is uh a warm shower place right here and uh the daughter has already taken to me she's not ready she walked right up to me there hey what's your name i think she's gonna be a handful but uh let me uh unpack the bag unpack the bike and then uh so this is my room i'm uh kind of sharing it with the kids play room that's what it looks like got my toilet over here and shower space over here i'm gonna do some laundry that's nice i can take a warm shower nice and uh i was checking this out wow that's actually really cool but i was looking at these coins right here they're all from the uh sholad jidai uh emperor shola the one that was emperor during world war two that's that's another story but anyways uh i was looking at these coins this is an olympic coin it's worth 1000 yen nowadays the biggest coin you see is 500 yen And so I was like, wow, that's pretty rare. A thousand yen coin.
But next to it, that is 10 ,000. And so it's basically like a $100 coin right there. It's not without easy to do it.
It's good, right? It's very good. Mm -hmm. I'm gonna eat good tonight.
So there's also a French family of four staying here. It's crazy. It's a big house with lots of stuff going on. A lot of people in and out of here.
I haven't quite figured it out yet. What's going on here? Not quite sure. Not quite sure what's going on. There's people all over the place.
There's kids running around. But there's good food on the table, and that makes me happy. Mm.
It's a flop. Let me see. Let me see.
2024-06-10 23:00
