Kriss's trip to Japan

[kriss]

EPISODE 1: THE FLIGHT TO JAPAN

unfortunately im now back from Japan which was fucking amazing, ill slowly add pics in here from the whole trip so be patient, all ill say is if you have the chance to go to Matsuri and drive DO IT!!!!

Ryan, Muski and I left melbourne on Monday 2 weeks ago flying to darwin for a 10 hour stop over, never again!!!! no offence to anyone that lives there but that place is a fucking shit hole, was so hard to make the 10 hours go by as quick as possible and ammongst the teenagers sipping on goon sacks and abo's asking for money we were ****** life. After 10 hours of hell we were finally on our way, Jetstar suck major balls for leg room and food and I got a bit sick between Darwin and the Phillipines where we had another stop over, after another 8 hours in the air we finally arrived in Japan at mid day on the Tuesday and i think thats where it all hit me that we were actually doing this and i was pumped.

i think Ryan managed to get pulled aside for an anal search twice on the way there, must be dodgy looking

















cool cloud was cool

[Lukey]

fuck yea

looking forward to more

[kriss]

EPISODE 2: GETTING TO THE TRACK

after getting off the plain and going through customs/quarenteen and Ryan being analy searched another 8 times we got our rail passes and attempted to catch a train to Ebisu, this was very over whelming as the train stations are the size of an australian suburb and have different lines, platforms train companies all running from each station with about 20 different platforms on different levels, luckily we had the guy at the rail pass place book us seats on 2 of our trains and print us off some tickets which had the platforms and train numbers/times ect which made it alot easier



if we didnt have these little tickets to show to the train conductors i dont think we would have got there lol, this is the map we had whcih is only the local lines around the city



waiting on the platform for our first train into tokyo i got to experience my first japanese toilet, full bum squirters, electric heated seat ect CRAZY!!



also saw our first vending machine, took me a few go's to figure out which was normal water





Muski bought a mini cock, i mean coke





made our way to tokyo to catch the Shinkansen to Koriyama, one thing i noticed straight away was how clean Japan is, no rubbish on the ground, no graffiti, no ciggie butts everywhere ect, the Shinkansen was so cool, really quiet, ice cold air con, could even pull a lever to spin the whole row of chairs around to face the row behind you



we started to pass all the farms and feilds which were so green and perfect, we also spotted a few cool cars from the train including aout 100 JZX 90's





after Koriyama we switched to a normal train again to get to Nihonmatsu which is where we needed to get off to go to Ebisu/The Drifters Lodge



right outside the station was a 7/11 so we stopped in to get some snacks and drinks, 7/11's have EVERYTHING, hot meals, alcohol, fruit, bandaids ect ect i bought so much food all for about $25AUS

to get to The Lodge we then had to catch a taxi, the first taxi in the rank was a HYbrid so we decided to skip it and jump into one of the cool Toyota with fender mirrors, yeh fender mirrors FUCKN JDM yo!! after alot of slow speaking and pointing and confusion we were on our way and after about 15 mins i was getting a bit worried that we might not be going where we needed to go but as we saw a train of modded 180's, S14's and JZX's coming down the hill I knew wew were in the right place, we arrived at The Lodge shortly after



first thing we were greeted with was Andy's JZS161





such a cool daily, when we arrived they were still at Ebisu but arrived about 15mins after us thanks god as it was about 35 degrees, this place was in such an awesome spot, vending machines at the door, running river and surrounded by a sort of rain forrest



this was the view from our room



after dinner i went to bed pretty early after a long 2 days of travelling and to prepare to get to the track nice and early the next day

[Khalil]

This is awesome haha ... more!!

[kriss]

EPISODE 3: FIRST DAY AT EBISU CHECKING OUT THE CARS

after a great nights sleep with the a/c cranking in our room we all had some breakfast and headed to the track, staying at The Lodge is great as its only 1.5kms from Ebisu circuit and for 1k yen for the whole week you get a shuttle bus to and from the track each day.

Upon arrival we were greeted by a few cars at the gate including this RWD WRX and an NA R34



payed my 5500yen entry for the day and made our way to Powervehicles workshop where we then got all our keys and headed down to there storage yard to pick up my R33 id purchased a month earlier, driving to the yard with Emily we got our first look at all the tracks and just how big Ebisu realy is, after a good 5 minute drive we arrived and i was happily greeted with my car, which I hoped wasnt going to be a lemon.



started first go and Ryan, Muski and I packed our shit into the boot and we were on our way, first impressions of the car were good, it ran perfect, clutch was good, coils and diff felt good, was actually a realy comfy car with the full interior still in it, first thing we did was went and put a full tank of fuel in it, the girl that works there was realy nice and always had cool shoes on



after filling up we wanted to head back to the storage yard to check out some of the other cars that had been left from previous matsuri's ect.
there was a few cars I knew were there and wanted to check out like this Cefiro that had an interesting RB20 in it with GTR 6 throttle intake manifold and R31 GTSR manifold on it





also Nisskids C33 Laurel from last Matsuri



and ofcourse Chris dejagers molested RB25 R32 GTST





this is a pic from the entry of Powervehicles storage yard, as you can see theres alot of stuffed cars lol



from there we headed back up the hill to check out another storage yard to check out the famous "red R31 Passage" that hasnt moved for about 5 years, being an R31 lover this was sad to see such a cool car just rotting away like that

[georgeMK1]

Tooooo fucking awesome

[kriss]

EPISODE 4: WALKING AROUND THE PITS

One of the good things about Ebisu is you arent in a mad rush to do anything coz theres so much track time, so we decided to take our time and have a good look around to see some cars that were there on the day and figure out exactly where all the tracks are as Ebisu is the size of a suburb

Made our way over to Driftland where we were greeted by a Street drift crew of JZX's, all 3 were slammed, loud and wide







the white JZX90 was on the track at the time and kept going til he poped his tires, which he seemed pretty pleased about as he posed for photos for us as he came in with a big grin on his face





next we went back up to Powervehicles as id organised to swap the set of 18's that were on my car for a pair of 17's as the tires are alot cheaper, as we came up the hill one car i was dieing to see just so happened to pull up, Stewy's C33 street car, the front track on this thing is rediculous





also had a chance to check out Eiji's extremely beat up JZX90 which you can see has had a hard life in his hands





by this time i was hanging to get out on the track, so i quickly installed a handbrake button id bought from Aus, changed wheels and put 4 new tires on and off we went down to the school course to see how the 33 went

[TRaNz]

miiinnnttt...moar stories and piccaazzzzz......and pics of Kriss =D

[P78]

liking this story

moar

[Oxer]

Fuck yes kriss.

I like how you left us in suspense haha. You posting this story on other forums too?

[kriss]

Fuck yes kriss.

I like how you left us in suspense haha. You posting this story on other forums too?

yeh its on NS aswel, slowly going through pics and adding stories to it haha

[anth]

How good is Japan. As much as people in the car scene talk it up, it totally lives up to the hype. I didn't even do car shit when I went and I loved it.

[Bflat]

How good is Japan. As much as people in the car scene talk it up, it totally lives up to the hype. I didn't even do car shit when I went and I loved it.

Same here. The closest I got was a crazed taxi driver doing what was essentially a touge run down mt. Hakone one day.

Japan is way up there on my list of countries visited (of the 30 something in the last few years) and is one I recommend to EVERYONE. The people alone make it worth it, so humble and polite.

[kriss]

EPISODE 5: FRIENDS ARRIVE AND WE HEAD TO SCHOOL COURSE AND NORTH COURSE

spent a good few hours on school course getting to know the car (which took all of 2 laps) and i loved it, stock 25 on 17's is perfect, would go up into 3rd mid corner fairly easily so I was pumped, went through my first pair of brand new tires with in a couple of hours, by that time Billie (ZIPTIE) Fish, Antonio and Jacob had arrived aswel which was awesome as i was sick of driving by myself





this is the 180 Billie and Fish had gone halvies in:



Which Billie managed to hit into the wall right where i was standing haha



this S13 was amazing, very low on 15's i think me and Ryan stared at it for a LONG time



Locky was also there in his black 180 showing the Japs how to do a burnout

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RSjrWPpis2A"]Locky Ebisu Summer Matsuri 2012 burnout - YouTube[/ame]

at this point Nic Wilson and his GF Lucy and Robin had arrived aswel both piloting JZX90's

after they had a bit of a go on School course aswel we decided to head on upto North Course to practice for G1 on Friday and aslo check on the view from higher up on the mountain







had a bit of a watch for a while to sus out the track and check out the cars





im just gna add all the north course stuff in this post as we spent ALOT of time there, best track ever

there was some pretty full on cars up at North Course practicing for G1

[chankone]

looking great so far! I just got back from a 3 week trip, looking to head back to do some sliding.

Just a tip for organising train tickets - hit www.hyperdia.com/ <-- For travelling by train, enter your start/finish stations and it works all the rest out including costs and times.

Was this an off-season week? How long was your trip? Have you kept the car? What did it cost you?

Enough questions. More photos please now please