When I started my research for the last episode, Takakonuma Greenland, I got a lot of results for Okpo Land. Sites like to compound the two, putting images of Okpo Land in a Takakonuma Greenland piece or vice versa. Several times, I came across references to Okpo Land as the true “scary” park, which is why I scheduled it for the week of Halloween.

Of course, in my research, I realized that the truth is quite a lot murkier than the internet rumors suggest. So let’s dig into the story of Okpo Land.

History of Okpo Land

Much of the actual history of Okpo Land is shrouded in mystery and rumors. It’s not helped by the language barrier: again, I don’t speak Korean, and Google Translate apparently has a much harder time with Korean compared to Japanese (from Takakonuma Greenland). This includes things like the actual opening date of the park. While the closing date is consistent (1999), the internet disagrees on the opening date.

Nearly all of the articles about Okpo Land online are a form of internet telephone, simply copying the same story idea and embellishing it without any efforts at verification of fact. These rumors call the park once one of the most popular theme parks in Asia, which seems hard to swallow. Some claim the park had been operational for decades prior to its 199 closure.

The truth seems a bit different. A local Geoje article explicitly gives the opening date as 1996, as does a different local news source. Another local news source describes the park as having only been open for two years prior to its closure. This makes sense – the park decor is all very 90s. 

But I’m getting ahead of myself, a little.

(If you want to start off with a few lesser-seen galleries before reading on, check out this one from johnwjohnson on Flickr and this one from Jordan/streetbeat85 on Flickr.)

Okpo Land: Geoje, South Korea

Okpo Land was located in Geoje, South Korea. Geoje is the name of the city, and Okpo-dong is one of the many neighborhoods within the city. And of course, given the name, you can see that Okpo Land was located in Okpo-dong.

It sat on the top of a hill, overlooking the harbor. Geoje is home to some of the largest shipbuilding in the world, including Daewoo Shipbuilding and Marine Engineering (DSME), one of the largest shipbuilders in the area. 

At the time, Okpo Land was the only amusement park on Geoje Island, so it did have a captive audience.

Okpo Land and South Korea’s Economic Crisis

However, the audience apparently wasn’t particularly interested in visiting Okpo Land. One of the news articles describes Okpo Land as having “sluggish business”. Another article describes the park as having an “operating deficit”. As lawinsider.com defines it: “insufficient cash flow from the Improvements to cover normal operating expenses and maintenance”. A third article blamed the “IMF cold wave”.

I’m not an economist, nor do I play one on TV. But from my understanding, this is how it went. See, in late 1997, there was a financial crisis in East and Southeast Asia, stemming from the financial collapse of the baht in Thailand, which spread and caused financial distress to a number of other countries. South Korea was one of the countries hardest hit by the crisis, and in December of 1997, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) stepped in with a $58.4 billion dollar plan to help stabilize South Korea’s economy. In return, the country had to undergo financial restructuring. “IMF programmes normally seek to reduce current account deficits, keep inflation in check, and keep domestic demand constrained.” 

The economy continued to shrink throughout 1998, but seemed to rebound in 1999, with president Kim Dae Jung declaring the crisis over in December 1999.

It was too late, however, for Okpo Land. 

It’s clear that against this background of financial crisis, the people of Geoje probably didn’t have the means to be spending money, and if they did, they were going to go to a different, bigger park. Okpo Land, which seems to have been started in a time of financial prosperity in 1996 or earlier, most likely couldn’t draw the paying crowds it needed in the hard times of 1997 and 1998. Before the park could try again in the summer of 1999, it was too late. 

The Geoje Times gives May of 1999 as the closure date for Okpo Land, and nearly every other source agrees with this year of 1999.

The Legend of Deaths at Okpo Land

Of course, what I haven’t told you at all is the dark side of the Okpo Land legend. 

You know, all the deaths.

Many internet legends talk about the one or more deaths at the park in its early years. And almost all internet legends about Okpo Land talk about the final death, the death in 1999.

See, we haven’t really talked about the park itself – we’ll get there – but there was a duck ride. Not a rollercoaster, as many descriptions say, but a monorail sky cycle business, another of the fun two-person visitor-pedalled rides in the sky. This one had a duck theme, a horrifying, horrifying duck theme. 

How can a duck theme be horrifying, you might ask? 

The duck on the front of each pedal car had an overly large head, a wide gaping mouth, and two comically large cartoon anime eyes, each pupil staring vacantly in opposite direction. I’ve seen a lot of spine-tingling things in my fascination with abandoned theme parks, but the duck heads from Okpo Land still remain at the top of my “creepiest things” list.

The legend goes that the final car on one train of the duck ride derailed, dangling from the tracks and dropping its rider to the ground, killing her instantly. Furthermore, the legend goes, the owner disappeared overnight, leaving the girl’s family without compensation or apology. The park was then reportedly shuttered by the authorities and declared unsafe, with all the rides still left in place. 

This, then, is the urban legend that surrounds Okpo Land.

Truth to the Rumors of Okpo Land?

I spoke over email with urban explorer Jon Dunbar, who runs the site Daehanmindecline. He is a well-known urban explorer in South Korea. He has an Instagram full of cute cat pictures, too. Jon’s images, used with or without permission, are some of the most common images you’ll see of Okpo Land in its abandoned state. I’m including a few of Jon’s images in my shownotes page and in social media promos for the episode with permission, and I encourage you to follow the links back to his site for more images. 

Jon told me over email about his history exploring the park between late 2007 and mid 2011. According to him, there was a single blog by a German photographer prior to his first trip which contained a version of that urban legend – lighter on details, with a death at the park followed by a second death which ultimately shuttered the park.

Jon went on to tell me about his first visit in late 2007, finding one of the duck rides hanging from the track. He imagined the rumored second death happening there, with the owners hypothetically leaving the ride broken, in situ, in the hurry to close the park permanently.

As Jon goes on to say, the German blog is long gone (and believe me, I’ve tried to find it! Not even the Wayback Machine could help with this one). So if you’re wondering where this rumor came from, about the girl dying after a fall from the duck ride, here’s how it got started.

The truth is probably somewhere in between the prosaic – not enough visitors, not enough money – and the salacious – deaths and quick park closures to escape a bad situation. And of course, we’ll likely never really know.

Abandoned Okpo Land

After its sudden closure in 1999, Okpo Land sat completely in place, abandoned, a magnet for urban explorers.  

The Geoje Times article from 2006 calls the abandoned park the “city’s monster”. Whether this is a mistranslation or accurate turn of phrase, I’m delighted by the description. 

City’s monster, let’s talk about this city’s monster. 

Okpo Land was small. 

Perched up on a hillside, it had great views, but not a lot of land area. This meant that, like Takakonuma Greenland and many of the other parks I’ve talked about on TAC, there were only a handful of rides. There were sort of three main areas – the swimming pool area (down below) and two separate hilltop areas, each anchored by one of the elevated rides.

Rides at Okpo Land

I’ve found a few park signs, but as I alluded to earlier, Google Translate has a harder time with Korean than it did with Japanese. However, I’ve spent some time with multiple images of the single park directional signs (two pink signs pointing one direction, two blue signs pointing another) and with the one image I’ve found of a park guide map, and I think I’ve gotten it mostly correct. (Unsurprisingly, AFTER I went through the trouble of sketching off a broken park version, I found a nice version from a guidebook. Ah.) Of course you know I’ve sketched my own version of the park map to help you understand the layout of the park. As always, if you’ve got corrections, comments, clarifications, or opinions, you can find my contact info at my website.

Going from least well-known to most well-known, let’s talk about the rides at Okpo Land.

Small Attractions at Okpo Land

There were these two large high top shoes. Not actually shoes, of course. These were miniature basketball hoops inside shoe facades, branded as “hightops”. It was an arcade game, classic and very cool, apparently manufactured by Skee Ball. I’ll link to a sale listing for a brand new one as well as an image of the very destroyed, very abandoned version.

Of course there were basic arcade game staples like air hockey.

And then there was a motion simulator, a Doron Precision Systems SRV brand. You’ve probably seen it at a carnival or a theme park near you. Here’s a video of one in motion. Of course, the simulator at Okpo Land was not in such fine shape after its years of abandonment, covered with graffiti in the available images online. 

In the park’s abandonment, all of these arcade games were outside in what appears to be an entrance plaza. This likely wasn’t their original home – the arcade building (labeled as “carnival” on the signs and map) seems to have been targeted by arsonists in June of 2011, according to a newspaper article.  Here’s a view via teaching engrish https://teachingengrish.files.wordpress.com/2011/03/img_74461.jpg https://teachingengrish.files.wordpress.com/2011/03/img_48811.jpg https://teachingengrish.files.wordpress.com/2011/03/img_74651.jpg However, that being said, these items have always been outside in the plaza in every image I’ve seen of the park, including the earliest images from 2007 and 2008, prior to the fires.

There was also once something called “battery”. I’ve checked and double-checked the translation, and Google’s so proud of this one, they give it a check mark when I run it through the translation site. This was located within the fenced square right off the entrance plaza, concrete painted green (here’s an image). I’m not sure what this actually was. One theory I’ve got stems from an early picture showing the view from the top of the coaster. There can be seen two large foam-looking items sitting off in the vegetation under the coaster, adjacent to the green battery square. Perhaps this attraction was a gladiator type thing, where guests could put on giant foam fighting gloves of a sort and “batter” one another? I don’t really know. The other idea, based on the two sets of bumper cars and the stack of bumper cars adjacent to this area, is that originally this was also a battery-operated bumper car area. 

Things That Go: Train, Bumper Cars, Rocket Ship at Okpo Land

Of course there was a miniature train. It’s an episode of TAC, which of course is more likely to feature a train than a carousel. 

Not much is known about the train. It ran in a small circular track roughly directly behind the main entrance, beneath the squirrel coaster. Here’s a promo image from the brochure: https://www.uer.ca/locations/viewgal.asp?picid=254356. There are almost no pictures of it, but the train and the tracks were left to decay with the rest of the park. Jon Dunbar photographed a rusted shell of an engine on a rusted and overgrown train track during his last visit in 2011. The rest of the train cars and the majority of the engine parts were long gone, though possible remnants of the train in a better state in late 2007, early 2008 can be seen in Jon’s images from an article on Dark Roasted Blend http://www.darkroastedblend.com/2008/01/abandoned-amusement-parks.html.

There were plenty of other things that go, as well. 

There were bumper cars too. Actually, there were two sets of bumper cars. One was sort of your basic sleek bumper car. The other set had a more vintage, old-timey overlay. The sleek bumper cars originally ran on a circular area underneath the rocket ship ride, while the vintage looking cars were stored away under a tarp in a storage building. Based on the park map, there was only ever one bumper car area, so perhaps these sets of cars could be switched in and out as themeing dictated. 

And then, making good use of the small land area, the flying rocket ship ride. The bumper cars were on a circular area at ground level, and the rockets sat on a circular platform above them, higher up in the air. 

It’s your standard “spin and go up and down” ride, like Astro Orbiter or Dumbo at Disneyland. The park’s guide map has a pretty good name for this one – it translates as “space warplane”! I love it. Though this ride was visible from the city, there’ not terribly much to say about it – simple “spaceship” cars that originally had small canopies. Reportedly for some years of the park’s abandonment, the cars were able to move around still. (See a photo of that here.)

Carousel and Viking Ship at Okpo Land

The carousel at Okpo Land is actually right next to the entrance gate and ticket booth. It’s not particularly special, in my opinion. The carousel structure itself is nicely detailed, but the horses are rather horrifying. Most of them have red eyes and leering grins, and there’s not much in the way of other detailing. These are low-budget carousel horses, not made from a particularly nice mold. 

Of course, you can call it a merry-go-round, too, if you like. I may not have touched on this in my episode on the Floyd J Moreland carousel, but there’s no true difference between a carousel and a merry go round. Some say that one has only horses and the other has many animals. Others point to the spin direction (clockwise or counter clockwise) or whether the twinkle lights are clear or colored. No matter what the point of comparison, there are as many rides that break the “rules” as fit them. So choose whichever name you like.

In the park’s abandonment, the horses are one of the more persistent amusements to be repurposed. They appear to have rusted out from the base carousel structure fairly quickly. Therefore, they were not only used for a photo prop in the standard way, but were carried around the park, placed in bumper cars, and general had a fun time with. Some were painted black, as if a vat of black paint were dropped over the top of them, and honestly it’s an improvement.

The abandoned carousel at Okpo Land is incredibly eerie – a rusting-out base, often filled with pools of water; tilting, fallen-over horses; knocked-in decorative panels; and still-bright, fiberglass decorations, broken but gleaming under the rust and creeping vegetation.

There was also a viking ship, a classic two-headed dragon themed swinging boat, much like the ones we’ve already talked about that existed at the abandoned Yangon amusement park and at Takakonuma Greenland. The swinging boat ride is a staple of many carnivals, fairs, and theme parks, so I don’t really need to go into detail. (Though I will add the interesting sidebar that the predecessor of this type of ride was called “The Ocean Wave” and was invented all the way back in the 1890s!)

The ride at Okpo Land was simply called “Viking”, which it proclaimed in big, English letters right on the sides of the ride. 

Interestingly, the Viking ride itself was positioned at nearly the apex of the hilly park, visible from many parts of the city. I’ve read several reports from urban explorers who had authorities called on them after people spotted them climbing the Viking structure even from outside the park.

Swimming Pool and Other Buildings at Okpo Land

Before I get to the two “big” rides, let me talk about the swimming pool and the other buildings at Okpo Land.

Per the park map, there were a variety of other buildings in Okpo Land. In the park’s abandonment, this isn’t really clear – one completely graffiti’d and destroyed building without any remaining signage pretty much looks like another. But according to the map, there were multiple buildings labeled “store”, a place for karaoke, and several “restaurants” and “restrooms”. A fairly large building on the map that isn’t ever seen in the exploration photos is the roller skating rink, which would’ve been behind the Viking ship. Maybe it wasn’t a building but just a flat concrete area? #6 on this promo brochure from the park shows what could have been the skating rink.

And #7 on that same map shows just a beguiling field of green. It’s really hard to accurately capture in any photo. But there was something called a “four seasons sliding range”, otherwise known as a long concrete slide down the hill, from the roller coaster area down by the swimming pool, all painted brilliant green, and perhaps originally covered in astro turf. Were there inner tubes or slick mats to slide down on? It’s not clear, and those small artifacts are long gone, or simply uninteresting, to any of the urbex photos available. 

Of course there was also the swimming pool complex, located down the hill from the other areas of the park, geographically closest to the squirrel coaster. The promo brochure for the park shows a variety of activities, including bowling and handball – it isn’t clear that these were available based on the abandoned photography I’ve seen, but it’s possible. There was definitely a variety of swimming pools, hot tubs, and saunas, however. In the abandoned stages, of course, the main lap pool was filled with stagnant, horrifying water.

Squirrel Roller Coaster and Rok ‘n Roll at Okpo Land

Squirrel Coaster = Fantasy Express

The squirrel coaster is the park’s second-most famous ride. The RCDB doesn’t know the name of it, just calling it unknown coaster. It took me a long time to find a name for it – the map I found that once was displayed in the park has the coaster shown but not captioned! Can you believe that? It was a struggle, folks. But eventually I found another map with one additional line in the key, and the name: Fantasy Express. I love it. Squirrel coaster = Fantasy Express. 

Anyhow, this is a cute little basic coaster. The track itself isn’t particularly noteworthy – just a simple shape without any inversions.

What IS noteworthy is the location (up on a hill, overlooking the harbor, adding to the thrill, and the theme. This coaster has a squirrel theme, or perhaps a chipmunk theme. A fat, gleefully chubby animal decorates the front of the car. He clutches what is presumably a nut or acorn in between his clasped hands. However, the casual glance makes it look perhaps a bit more salacious. I’ll leave it at that. 

This coaster is also somewhat notable in that the coaster train (singular) is permanently stuck on the lift hill, unable to move either forward or back at the movement of explorers. This has led to some striking photos of Okpo Land taken from the top of the coaster’s lift hill, looking back down: a gleeful woodland animal smiling back up at you almost menacingly, halfway up the lift hill; the blue roofs of the pool and sauna complex glittering with reflected light from the nearby harbor on the left; and the green, tangled climbing vines on the right, taking back the coaster and the rest of Okpo Land.

Rock ‘ n Roll OR Squirrel Buckets

Nestled up above the squirrel coaster by the Space Fighters and the ducks was another often photographed ride. This one probably has the best name of them all, and I double-checked my translations multiple times. That’s probably what made research for this episode take so long. Anyhow, Google Translate tells me the name of this ride is…Squirrel Buckets. 

Yep, squirrel buckets. I don’t even know about the etymology of that one. This is a beautiful version of the classic Rock ‘n Roll / Looper ride that was popular a couple decades ago. You’ll remember it disassembled at Takakonuma Greenland and semi-operational at the abandoned Yangon park. And of course, you can find an operational version of the ride at Knoebel’s in the US. Still not ringing a bell? Tuna cans on a carousel frame, and they all go round and round. I think it’s such a picturesque ride, but I would never ever ride this one.

In the park’s abandonment, climbing vines took over this ride most of all, and in many pictures, you can only see the decorative finial at the center post of the ride, surrounded by subtle mountains of green.

Duck Sky Cycle at Okpo Land

Of course, the park’s most famous, or infamous, ride is one we’ve already touched on, so I’ve saved it for last. Referred to on the guide maps simply as “Sky Cycle”, this is the supposed killer ride, the eerie, duck-themed ride that still gives me the creeps every time I scroll past an image of that gaping duck mouth.

Why, why would someone ever make a ride with such an eerie, chilling duck-faced overlay? Why is something simple like a children’s themed duck ride so unsettling in a world of admittedly much worse horrors? I can’t explain it.

Whether or not the duck sky cycle actually killed someone, what IS clear is that one of the sky cycle trains is on the track … wrong. 

Let’s back up a little. This is different from the sky cycle at Takakonuma Greenland. There, you had spindly little individual cars. Here at Okpo Land, the sky cycles have a solid overlay of duck theme. At first glance they appear to be connected in trains, but closer inspection of the photos indicates that the cars are separate, with bumpers on the front and back of individual cars to keep them from coming too close to one another.

Anyhow, there are many duck sky cycle cars in repose at the station at Okpo Land. It appears that there’s a side spur, where cars can be switched on and off the main track when higher capacity is needed. 

All of the ducks face the same direction, going clockwise around the track. 

Except one.

Two cars, two ducks, face the opposite direction (counter-clockwise). The front car is on the station platform, and the back car is missing its’ duck head facade, dangling, chick butt facing the ground.

Let me stop and tell you right now. That story, about the car derailing and killing the girl, and being left to dangle in place in the spot where she died?

Impossible.

Let me tell you what I think, and fast forward if you’d rather I not squash your theories about the legend of Okpo Land. 

There’s no possible way that a sky cycle car would be placed on the track going the wrong direction (counter-clockwise) when all the other sky cycle cars are going clockwise.

My hypothesis is that a person visiting the park in its abandonment decided, for whatever reason, to turn a car or two around. Is this possible?

Looking closely at the pictures, I think it is. The lead car is off the track, on the station loading platform, with one “wheel” in between the track and one on the station platform; the back balanced on the station. The car clearly has two Miller patented underfriction wheels in front, the kind used on nearly every modern coaster to keep cars from flying off the track during fast turns. The wheels are meant to go on either side of the track, keeping the cars in place.

In the back, however, from looking at other cars, we can see underneath the “duck butt” where passengers would sit and pedal, there’s simply some flimsy-looking metal arms, guiding the car roughly on the track. Likely, the car’s weight and the passengers’ weight were presumed to keep the car in place.

Here’s a close up view of the dangling, supposed killer car. It’s held onto the track by one single wheel in front, and everything else dangles.

I think what happened is that some people were having a good time and tried to turn two of the cars around. Or, perhaps not that, but were trying to “get the cars off the tracks” presumably to have fun with them in various places around the park. So these imaginary people lifted the backs of the cars up and wriggled and wrenched them until they could swing the cars around off the track. 

Then what? You can’t carry them down the stairs – too heavy. So they pushed the cars backwards along the track and tried to push them over the edge of the station. But for whatever reason, they couldn’t, or didn’t, finish the task. So one car was left cockeyed at station level, and the other was left dangling over the edge by a single wheel. This one they tore the duck facade off. 

From there, rumors could easily spread, as it is easy to imagine a horrific fate from such a wrenching-looking situation. But truly, the ride in operation would not have derailed this way, with all of the other cars the way they are.

This is only a theory about what happened to the sky cycle, but I’d say it’s a guess close to the truth. 

A girl may have fallen off the duck ride and died, I don’t know about that – it is awfully high. But the car wasn’t left dangling in its place – that’s just not how the ride would be set up. The final, ominous positions of the broken duck cars were most certainly done after the fact. 

Demolition of Okpo Land

It wasn’t until late 2011 that the park was actually demolished, over a decade after its closure. 

In the meantime, plenty of urban explorers visited and photographed the park. You can find all kinds of photos and trip reports linked in my references section (below). Seemingly on each visit, the beheaded duck facade was in a different place – was it on a visitor this time, was it on a carousel horse, was it tucked away in the vines to try and spook someone? 

Ultimately, it appears the park became a target of vandalism and arson until the city and the ownership companies couldn’t ignore it any longer. It was called the “city’s monster”, collecting trash and garbage, becoming increasingly rusted and blighted up on top of the hill right over the harbor.

Though some reports claim a single company purchased the land and then did nothing with it for years, other reports differ. One local news source actually breaks the sale of Okpoland down. The article states that “Short-term mortagages were set up by three people”, and they note the park was sold again to a Mr. Park in November of 2000. Then there were two “seizure and claims for transfer of ownership”, but the article notes that these were “eliminated”. Ultimately, that large shipbuilding company DSME purchase the site in November of 2006. The article reports that the company had plans to redevelop the site and build something else (a hotel, residential complexes, etc). However, considering that as of the time of this recording, the land is still bare as far as I know, I’m guessing something went wrong. The main article I’m referring to right here talks about urban management plans, and I think a little something is lost in translation – perhaps there were issues with zoning or other city ordinances. 

So like I said, ultimately in 2011, the park was demolished and returned to bare earth. 

A video from 2017 is available on YouTube from user A Million Toms showing a hike up to the site of the former theme park. It appears easy to access the site, with broken down fencing blocking the road from cars but not stopping an adventurous pedestrian. You can see primarily bare land and vegetation in the video, although A Million Toms does come across a broken piece of fiberglass decoration – a former buffalo plaque from the Viking ship. 

Here’s a great image from one of the park brochures, showing an artist’s rendition of how the site was supposed to be https://www.uer.ca/locations/viewgal.asp?picid=254354. 

Conclusions

People love to come up with rumors, and sensational stories certainly build upon themselves when passed from person to person in urban legend format. Such is the case of Okpo Land. In the later years of its abandonment, a broken duck-themed sky cycle, placed just so on accident or purpose by a visitor to the park after its closure, spurred rumors of death, of an owner who left everything in place and ran, or perhaps he was killed in a car accident, but certainly he gave no recompense to the girl’s family.

It’s all rumor. 

The park closed due to lack of money in the background of the poor economy of the late 90s. A series of different owners and bueracratic issues delayed the demolition of the park and still have stalled any new redevelopment there. 

The truth, of course, is kind of boring.

Okpo Land seemed like a charming small park with some truly bizarre theming. The duck face from the sky cycle is honestly one of the spookiest things I’ve seen, with haunting eyes that stare in either direction and seem to follow you as you move. 

But ultimately it was just a simple amusement park. A fun place for kids and families while it lasted, with boring and expected reasons for closure. Too, it seems to have been a fun place to visit in its long abandonment, even if the deadly rumors stem from staged rides and word of mouth. 

It is Halloween season when this episode is released, so of course you can imagine whatever urban legend you like. The truth is boring and fictional stories are much, much more thrilling.

Remember that what you’ve read is a podcast! A link is included at the top of the page. Listen to more episodes of The Abandoned Carousel on your favorite platform: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Spotify | RadioPublic | TuneIn | Overcast | Pocket Casts | Castro. Support the podcast on Patreon for extra content! Comment below to share your thoughts – as Lucy Maud Montgomery once said, nothing is ever really lost to us, as long as we remember it.

Okpo Land Guide Map

1. 회전목마 merry-go-round
2. Restaurant
3. 카니발 코너 carnival corner
4. 수영장 swimming pool
5. 사 우 나 sauna         (missing – fantasy express – the COASTER) either spelled like this 판타지 표현 or 환상특급
6. 미니기차 mini train
7. 밧 데 리 카 battery?
8. 노 래 방 karaoke
9. 매점 store
10. 바 이 킹 viking
11. 관리사무실 . 화장실 administrative office, restroom
12. 분식코너 food corner
13. 롤러 스케이트장 roller skating rink
14. 매점 store
15. 사계절썰매장 four season sledding range
16. 음식점 . 화장실 restaurant * restroom
17. 스카이 사이클 sky cycle (ducks)
18. 범퍼카 bumper cars
19. 우주전투기 “space fighter” (rockets)
20. 다람쥐 통 squirrel bucket
21. 휴게실 “Rest area” (bathroom?)

References

1. #옥포랜드 – Twitter Search / Twitter. Twitter. https://twitter.com/hashtag/%ec%98%a5%ed%8f%ac%eb%9e%9c%eb%93%9c. Accessed October 16, 2019.
2. 1997 Asian financial crisis. In: Wikipedia. ; 2019. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=1997_Asian_financial_crisis&oldid=919798166. Accessed October 27, 2019.
3. A Million Toms. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCUqktDv1ZmuDb2_ZngzlCEA. Accessed October 16, 2019.
4. aga. Abandoned Amusement Park.; 2008. https://www.flickr.com/photos/aga_and_jonas/2272380315/. Accessed October 16, 2019.
5. rachel. abandoned amusement park. Loose in the World. May 2011. https://rachelinbusan.wordpress.com/2011/05/08/abandoned-amusement-park/. Accessed October 16, 2019.
6. Abandoned Locations: Okpo Land – YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mPRwnmedwMQ. Accessed October 15, 2019.
7. Abandoned Theme Parks – Photos. https://www.facebook.com/pg/AbandonedThemeParks/photos/?tab=album&album_id=136178916537892. Accessed October 16, 2019.
8. broke6.pdf. http://www.daehanmindecline.com/broke/broke6.pdf. Accessed October 16, 2019.
9. broke12.pdf. http://www.daehanmindecline.com/broke/broke12.pdf. Accessed October 16, 2019.
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11. Schatz Blackrose M. Chinny Chin Chin: Raps and Rhymes Promoting Literacy in Young Children. Port Macquarie: Tell Me Books; 2012.
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The post Okpo Land appeared first on The Abandoned Carousel.

Listen or read this episode of The Abandoned Carousel. Both versions are below.

Podcast cover background photo is by 4045 on freepik.com. Theme music is from “Aerobatics in Slow Motion” by TeknoAXE. Incidental music is “Long Note Two” and “Cryptic Sorrow” by Kevin Macleod / incompetech.com.

The Creepypasta: “Takakanonuma Greenland”

In Japan’s Fukushima Prefecture, there is an abandoned amusement park known as Takakanonuma Greenland. It sits in the outskirts of Hobara, a section of the Japanese city of Date. Very little is known about this park, and its exact location is largely unknown. You can’t find it on any Japanese map, as it simply isn’t there. Supposedly, its coordinates are 37°49’02.16″N 140°33’05.78″E , but if they are put into Google Maps, the search will be directed to the center of Hobara. This is inaccurate, since the park is hidden in a mountainous, rural area.

The only major information known about Takakanonuma Greenland is that it opened in 1973, and closed two years later. Some claim that this was due to poor ticket sales and needed renovations, but locals say that it was because of a significant amount of deaths on the rides. Miraculously, the park reopened in 1986, but struggled to remain open due to increased competition from bigger parks such as Tokyo Disneyland, as well as financial trouble. Finally, in 1999, Takakanonuma Greenland closed for good.

Following its closure, the amusement park was left to rot. Photographs from urban explorers who have infiltrated the area show a massive amount of decay. The ferris wheel and the roller coaster are covered in rust, the entrance is covered in graffiti, and the premises are being reclaimed by plants. The most notable feature of the park is the dense fog that always looms over it, giving off a Silent Hill feel. Like the information about the area, there is very little photography and video of it.

Allegedly, Takakanonuma Greenland was demolished in 2006, and now sits as an empty lot. However, in 2007, a citizen of the United Kingdom named Bill Edwards claimed to have visited an untouched, completely intact park. Supposedly, he took numerous pictures that were identical to those taken before the park’s supposed demolition, showing the same rusty, forgotten rides. However, according to rumor, when uploading these photos, only one appeared on his computer. This picture shows the entrance to the park on a foggy night, illuminated by the flash from the camera. In the center of this picture, you can barely make out the figure of what looks like a six year old girl in a white dress. She appears to be staring at the photographer with a serious, indifferent face. The girl has never been identified, and the whereabouts of Bill Edwards are currently unknown…

Creepypasta.com, April 26, 2013

Many elements of the story I just told you contain truth, like some of the best stories, but parts are fiction. What I just told you was a creepypasta, posted on Creepypasta.com on April 26, 2013. 

What is a Creepypasta?

Before we can get to the truth behind Takakonuma Greenland, let’s talk about “creepypasta”. What is a creepypasta? 

I’ll be drawing heavily in this section from an excellent article by the phenomenal Aja Romano, now at Vox and formerly at the Daily Dot. I encourage you to read the whole article.  

Creepypasta is one of those internet-y portmanteau words. It’s a spin-off of “copypasta”, a portmanteau of “copy/paste”. Copypasta was first used as a term online around 2006 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copypasta). This was essentially blocks of text that were copied and pasted around the internet, often with a spam or troll intent. Wikipedia gives examples of the “Navy Seal” copypasta and the script from the Bee Movie https://www.inverse.com/article/25329-bee-movie-memes-explained-script-youtube-videos. 

Creepypasta, then, began as a similar idea – text that is easily copied and pasted – but with the intent of sharing realistic horror stories. These often have a basis in reality/fact, and are presented as a journal entry or a “hey I was there” type story. Yep, they’re modern urban legends, modern versions of the “Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark” series that was the height of popularity when I was a kid (and how’s that for dating me?). 

At their most basic form, creepypasta are only a few paragraphs long, just enough to send a little or big shiver up your spine. Others have expanded the bounds of the genre, with multiple updates, images, realistic social media account postings, etc. Think Blair Witch Project. 

Creepypasta.com was created in 2008, and the related subreddit r/NoSleep was established in 2010.

Originally, the stories were anonymous. That was kind of the point. Jessica Roy in Time points to early stories shared around the depths of Usenet and chain emails in the 1990s. Aja Romano points to the story of Ted the Caver as the earliest true creepypasta, appearing on Angelfire in 2001 and telling the story of an explorer and an increasingly frightening system of caves.

Today, authorship is more important. Ironically, copying and pasting of creepypasta is less common now, as a result, being seen as IP theft. Some creepypastas have been spun into original novels or other media properties. Truly, today, they are simply collections of horror-themed stories more than the anonymous, realistic paragraph they originated as. 

In Romano’s article and the Wikipedia article for creepypasta, both linked in the episode’s references section, you can find a few of the more popular creepypasta. These include Slender Man, a story that has not only been referenced in pop culture since its creation, but which also has influenced a real life murder.

The Real Story of Takakonuma Greenland

The story I read at the beginning of the show was posted to creepypasta.com in 2013. Much of the tale does ring true. Let’s dig in and separate the wheat from the chaff of the “real” story of this mysterious abandoned theme park, and debunk some of the taller tales. It’s both interesting and challenging that most of the information available about this park is in the form of fiction.

So, Takakonuma Greenland. One of the most popular abandoned or haunted theme parks is this one, and it regularly appears on lists around the internet.    

Before I even get into it, one of the interesting things is the differences between English-language posts about the park, and Japanese-language posts about the park. It’s really only in the English posts that the wild tales abound; the Japanese posts recount some of the wilder English tales but all seem to comment on how Americans (or “foreigners” sometimes) always place the park on the lists of “top most haunted places” and so on. 

The Name: Takakonuma Greenland vs Takakanonuma Greenland

First, the name. American sites including creepypasta frequently spell the name as Takakanonuma Greenland. Surprisingly, not actually the name. The site Bloggitos helped clarify this topic. Locally, the park appears to simply have been called “Greenland”. As the park picked up steam with Americans, the kanji were mistranslated. Now I don’t speak Japanese, but here’s what Bloggitos says. There’s a joining particle in Japanese, “no”. However, proper nouns wouldn’t use this (example: Indiana-no-University would be any university in Indiana, not Indiana University specifically). 

So instead of Takakanonuma, the correct name is Takakonuma (Takako, a place (marsh), and Numa or Numanishi, another place).

Occasionally you’ll also see references to the place as Kokonuma Greenland, but I’ve not been able to find any clear etymology on that one. 

Location of Takakonuma Greenland

You might’ve missed it from the creepypasta I read at the beginning, but the location of this abandoned park also features heavily in some later versions of the story. You will alternately see the city referred to as either Date or Hobara. Hobara is the old name; along with 20 other towns and villages, the area has been known as the modern city of Date since January 2006.

Date, though, is located in Fukushima Province. 

Many listeners of the podcast will immediately be familiar with that name. Fukushima of course is the site of the 2011 nuclear meltdown at the Fukushima I nuclear power station.

2011 Nuclear Meltdown at Fukushima Daiishi Nuclear Power Plant

In brief, in March 2011, the “2011 Tōhoku earthquake” occurred. It was the most powerful earthquake ever recorded in Japan, and the fourth-most powerful earthquake ever recorded in the world. The quake triggered tsunami waves which swept across the islands. The quake and subsequent tsunamis are said to have killed over 10,000 people. 

One result of this natural disaster was the failure of the cooling systems at Fukushima’s Daiishi Nuclear Power Plant. This failure is the most severe nuclear disaster since the 1986 Chernobyl meltdown. Chernobyl and Fukushima are the only two incidents to be labeled Level 7 on the Nuclear Event Scale (with a 7 being the worst level, “major event”. For a comparison, the 1979 Three Mile Island incident was labeled Level 5). 

With the failure of the cooling systems, three of the reactors at Fukushima Daiichi experienced nuclear meltdowns and hydrogen explosions. As with any nuclear incident, the concern is for the spread and release of radioactive materials. An initial 20km evacuation zone was set up, and has since come down. Contamination of the Pacific Ocean with radioactive cesium has been the primary concern from this incident.

As of 2018, radiation inside the reactor buildings is reportedly still too high to safely enter. However, despite controversy, various world organizations do not predict any significant ongoing health effects from the accident.

Fukushima Daiishi Meltdown and Takakonuma Greenland

While this nuclear accident was a huge one, it didn’t affect Takakonuma Greenland. 

The nuclear power plant and the theme park are located about 100km from one another, far apart. (That’s 62 miles, American friends.) 

The reason this is relevant is because many of the versions/rumors of the park’s history claim that the park is soaking in toxic radiation from the 2011 power plant meltdown. Based on geography alone, this is completely untrue.

The True History of Takakonuma Greenland

With some basic facts established, let’s run through a more complete, true history of Takakonuma Greenland.

Takakonuma Family Park

Takakonuma Greenland opened as Takakonuma Family Park in 1973, on the side of a small mountain or hill. At the time it opened, the town the park was located in was called Hobara. 

(https://goo.gl/maps/3ZsCpuFowVdcEvyT7)(“Numanishi Senouemachi”)

From what I can understand, Hobara is a place out in the countryside, rural, though considered densely populated for a rural area. The area is full of rice fields and fruit orchards. At the time, there were no other amusement parks in the area, so the park did reasonably well.

On Facebook, in fact, I found photos from the park’s operation during this time. The album is titled “Around 1975 at Takakonuma Greenland” and there are two pictures. One shows the chain tower (swings) and the other shows a petting zoo.

However, it didn’t last. Business deteriorated, and the park shut down after two years. 

Not only did it shut down, it stayed closed for almost a decade.

Takakonuma Greenland’s Operating Years

After its closure as Takakonuma Family Park, the property was sold. I’ve seen references to both Nankai Kogyo Co., Ltd. and Tokyo Real Estate. Either way, the property stayed closed until the early 80s, undergoing refurbishment and upgrades. I’ve seen two different sources for the reopening date: spaicy.jp gives April 1982, and the RCDB gives 1985 as the date. Either way, the park reopened under the new name, Takakonuma Greenland.

Reception of Takakonuma Greenland

The park quickly gained popularity and notoriety for being the only park with a roller coaster in the area. (Spoiler: it actually had two!) It’s not entirely clear whether the coasters were installed during the reopening and rebranding, but this would seem most likely. The 1975 photos I mentioned earlier do not show any coasters on the hill, lending support to this theory.

For the next few years, things went well. Admission was relatively cheap – 700 yen ($6.50) for adults, and 500 yen ($4.50) for kids – though each ride inside required tickets, purchased at additional cost. 

However, mega parks began being built – Tokyo DisneySea and Tokyo Disneyland, 3.5 hours away. Universal Studios Japan, 6 hours away. And plenty of other, newer small parks were even closer. Instead of visiting Takakonuma Greenland, guests started to go elsewhere. It wasn’t convenient to get to Takakonuma Greenland using public transportation.

Because at the same time, the amenities at Takakonuma Greenland were rapidly aging. Some sites describe the place as “severely outdated”.

The area is humid, moist, and sees regular rain and snow. Rides required constant maintenance out in the elements. With the problems introduced in the economic bubble collapse of the 90s in Japan, they weren’t getting the maintenance they needed. There were no upgrades, no new rides. In fact, rides began to be taken away before the park itself closed. 

And the location of the park on the hillside was difficult – there was constant maintenance needed to trim back the vegetation, and there are also reports about erosion and partial collapses of some areas.

By the end of the park’s operation, the park’s schedule was erratic. Some months only open on Wednesdays, others only open on weekends. 

It seems that the park also constantly changed management over the short period it was open. One source reports five different owners between 1982 and 1999.

Closure of Takakonuma Greenland

Ultimately, the reason given for Takakonuma Greenland’s closure in 1999 is the same reason we see for so many parks – “management difficulties”, aka “it was no longer profitable to operate the park”. Yes, the owners could keep running it, but investing additional money in the park in the form of maintenance or new rides was a losing strategy. (Click for an image of the closure notice.)

You see, zooming out more broadly, Japan’s economy had hit a rough patch. In the second half of the 20th century, Japan’s economy was strong, perhaps overly so. The economic bubble burst at the start of the 1990s with a stock market crash, leading to the “Lost Decade”. The GDP fell, real wages fell, and the country experienced a stagnant price level that took decades to recover from.

Against this economic background, it’s not surprising that the choice was made to shutter Takakonuma Greenland.

The descriptions in translation from the Japanese sites are beautiful – the park was “left in the wind to wave”, says one site. Reportedly, the park owners literally just left. They didn’t want to pay to dismantle the park. They simply walked away. Other sites describe the situation differently, saying that indecision on the future of the property was the reason for the park’s long abandonment.

It took almost another decade before the park was demolished, leaving plenty of time for urban explorers to visit, and for rumors to fester.

Abandoned Takakonuma Greenland

Incorrect Coordinates of Takakonuma Greenland

It’s not clear why all of the stories about Takakonuma Greenland include the incorrect longitudinal coordinates. I’ll include a direct link to the streetview of the site as it stands today (or at least, 2014, which is when a Google car last drove by): https://goo.gl/maps/mEf7xAg23mZ3XQBp6 and https://goo.gl/maps/6rNGVfiDF4oj1UUC6. Type in “Numanishi Senouemachi” into Google Maps, and you’ll be in the right place. 

I suppose including directly false information in the creepypasta makes the tale more mysterious, but I do hate to see it. 

Where Are the Photos of Takakonuma Greenland?

One of the other big parts of the Takakonuma Greenland legend is that there are no photos of it, or few photos of it. You might think of the few very popular images: a rusty coaster in the fog, orange red rust dripping down over peeling white paint. In another of the images, a strange, small Ferris wheel looms in the background of the rusty white coaster, ominous in the fog. And a third, from a different angle: a green, grassy hill with a sign in large white Japanese characters. At the top center, the Ferris wheel, faded behind fog clouds. And to the right, a white roller coaster, on incredibly high supports, looking like something out of a horror movie as it looms over the hill in the fog.

Or, as the creepypasta states, despite many photos taken by an urban explorer by the name of Bill Edwards, only one photo ever would upload, featuring a haunted girl in a white dress on a foggy night.

Of course, none of this is true. The history of the park is well-documented if you look in the right places.

The thing is, despite the modern legend about the park, the place was originally just a small local theme park that was open for a couple decades. Not many people visited the park, and many of the touristy, operational pictures and videos of the place are likely shoved in closets and dusty photo albums. 

That’s not to say that there aren’t photos and videos, though. Today’s modern Google Translate makes it (while not perfect) a lot easier to search for things in other languages. And boy howdy, it’s probably not surprising that on Japanese language sites, there are a lot more factual details, fond commenters reminiscing about their childhood at the park, and of course photos, and videos of Takakonuma Greenland. 

 In fact, I’m going to shape the majority of the rest of the episode around a photo tour from an urban explorer “Kuke” who visited in fall of 2004. In addition, those primary images I described that you always see floating around the internet? Most of those are by “Jens of Japan”, and you can find them on his Flickr page or his website. I’ll include links to each relevant image in the shownotes. We haven’t really talked about the park in any detail, only about it as an abstract concept. So let’s take a visit to Takakonuma Greenland as it was. 

A Visit to Takakonuma Greenland

Of course, there was a car park at the front of the park, though the park was reasonably accessible by train and bus. After you got out of your car, you could walk with your fellow visitors up to the park gate. This was shaped like a castle gate, with a ticket line on one side and a park office on the other side. At one time, the park’s name would’ve been proudly spelled out across the top of the gate archway. By the time of the park’s abandonment, this had long fallen down. Of course, the whole thing is done up in a rather ugly shade of teal green, with red roofs on top of each turret tower.

To the right of the gate as you face it, there was the park map, up on a very large billboard. This remained after the park closed, and I’ve drawn my own version of the map to include throughout this section. Scroll down to the very last section of this post for the map key.

The map is our first indication of the park’s decline even prior to its closure. Several of the rides were apparently closed prior to the park’s closure, as their names were scraped off the painted sign. 

Enterprise and Looper at Takakonuma Greenland

In fact, the most obvious closed ride is missing. It would’ve been immediately in front of you as you entered through the park’s gate. First, of course, was the general ticket booth, small and non-imposing, where guests could purchase more tickets for each ride. The rides were listed with the number of tickets each took.

Behind the booth, there once was an Enterprise ride. You might remember this ride from the abandoned Yangon Amusement Park episode (theabandonedcarousel.com/9) – it’s a flat ride that starts out like a merry go round, and then raises up at an angle more like a Ferris wheel once it’s up to speed. 

The Enterprise is clearly visible in the park map – it’s an incredibly distinctive ride. But there are no photos of this ride, not even a hint of its demolished state. Perhaps it was planned and never added? The space does appear quite tight. Or perhaps it was removed.

To the left of the main entrance plaza was another classic flat ride: this one is called the Looper or the Rok n Roll. The Takakonuma Greenland version might have been called “Twister”. You might remember me describing this one in the abandoned Yangon park episode as well – “tuna cans on a carousel frame”. I’ve learned a wee bit more about these rides since then. In the US, you can find a refurbished version of this ride at Knoebels in PA. The style of ride is also called the Rok ‘n Roll. 

You essentially spin your tuna can back and forth (or 360) while the whole carousel of tuna cans also goes around in a circle. Vomit comet might also be an appropriate name. An image from Jens in 2006 shows this ride well-demolished, one of the tuna cans sitting askew on top of a circular platform full of rubble. Kuke over at Biglobe.ne.jp saw some of the tuna cans sitting on the ground, disassembled. An even earlier visit shows a more clear picture of this area: image 1 / image 2.

As you stood there in the entrance plaza, one thing stood out: how steep and hilly this park was. The entrance was at the base of the hill, and the ferris wheel stood at the pinnacle. The rest of the park rose up the hillside in front of you, terraced paths and platforms making space for the rides in front of the trees. 

Merry-go-round, Swings, and Train at Takakonuma Greenland

Let’s now turn to the right and take a look at one of the most photogenic parts of Takakonuma Greenland: the young children’s area, with a train, swings, and a merry-go-round.

During the park’s operation, the merry-go-round stood out. I’ll include a link to a photo of the operational merry-go-round from a visitor at the time right here. Even in its abandonment, the merry-go-round stands out, with beautiful, elegant horses, all white with colorful saddles and bridles. (I have to say, despite all my carousel research last week, I can’t quite tell which style these horses would be categorized under. Guess I’d better keep studying.) There were ornate decorations on the central column of the carousel, as well – gold-colored leaf on fanciful carvings around several mirrors. 

By the time the park was abandoned and had begun to be visited by urban explorers, the brilliantly-colored canopy was long gone, faded and hanging down from the skeletal support structure in tatters. This link is to an incredible image of the sunset over the carousel. Some of the horses had been stolen, their supports beginning to rust and break. And that gold-leaf had long since flaked away, leaving behind sinister black carvings with, oddly enough, red roses remaining.

Next to the carousel stood the Chain Tower, a menacing name for a standard swing-type ride that had been at the park since the beginning in the 70s. Originally, photos show it was painted in a colorblock yellow and blue scheme. By the time of the park’s abandoned days, the ride had clearly been through a number of different paint schemes. During the ride’s operation, the children sat in chairs that were attached by two ropes to the triangle “handle” of each swing position. By the time the park was abandoned, the seats were long gone, leaving behind only the eerie dangling triangles.

Surrounding this area was the SL, or steam locomotive. Yes, of course there was a miniature train. It took two tickets to ride, according to a 2005 image of the sign. I’m starting to think that I should’ve given this podcast a train-themed name instead of a carousel-themed name. Our friend, explorer Kuke, has images of the train station, showing a nice shaded spot to wait for the small little train. Of course, by the time of the known urbex images we’ve got, in 2004 and 2006, the train itself was yes, long gone. This image from an overpass over the train tracks shows the structure of the children’s area, including its proximity to the gate.

Buildings at Takakonuma Greenland

Walking from the overpass up the hill, one sees a tan building, nicely built, but yes, painted tan all over, including windows and clocks. Perhaps more camoflauge than straight up tan. Anyhow, this was a multi-purpose building. During the park’s operation, it served as both a haunted house and as a natural history insect museum, though not at the same time. This is one of the items scraped off the guide map, so it clearly closed some time before the park itself.

Inside, not much is left by the time of the abandoned walkthrough in 2004, just oddly painted walls and a few broken game consoles. This building was used for the filming of the movie Kamen Rider 555, thus the camo paint job. 

In the center of the park, across from the former haunted house, sits the largest building in the park. This too got a camo paint job for the movie filming. I was unable to translate the actual name of this one, but explorer Kuke calls it “free rest area”. Inside, a mishmash of broken game consoles again, as well as a store. There’s some comment that it might have been a theatre or stage. Across from this, a small shop that was a snack house. This also included a storage shed, in which were stored a box of skates and a sad Zamboni. At one time, the park hosted ice-skating – it’s not clear if there was an artificial rink somewhere or if the skating was done on the marsh for which the park is named. 

Sky Cycle and Go Karts at Takakonuma Greenland

Going out of the buildings and you’re already at the left-hand side of the park. Yep, it’s a small park. There stood a Sky Cycle, the next ride you’d come across. Sky Cycle, how fancy is that? This is a two person monorail-type ride, where guests pedal themselves around an elevated track at their own pace, overlooking the park below. It’s a simple ride but sort of easily terrifying – there’s nothing but a basic seatbelt to keep you in place, so far above the ground, and only your own feet can move you along. The cars are spindly and fragile looking, like odd bird skeletons.

By 2004 and 2006 when our urban explorers visited, a section of the Sky Cycle track had fallen down, or perhaps had been removed. This led to some excellent photos, where Sky Cycles were guided to the end of the track over time and pushed off into large piles. Images: image one / image two / image three. I’ll link to a video of the Sky Cycle still in operation at a different park – this was apparently a viral thing a few years back.

The Sky Cycle track ran right above the small Go-Kart track, vastly overgrown by the abandoned days, go-karts long since stolen and stripped of parts. Not much remained to be documented, just a few empty shells of cars looking like forlorn and rusty lawnmowers.

Behind the go-karts, we walk up the hill to the stars of the park: the Bobster, the Adventure Coaster, and the Ferris wheel.

Bobster Roller Coaster at Takakonuma Greenland

The park gained popularity and notoriety for being the only park with a roller coaster in the area. In fact, it actually had two, though this isn’t clear from the basic abandoned photos. I’ll link to an image which sets the scene nicely, showing the entrance to the Bobster, with the Adventure Coaster just up the hill out of frame. Bobster was made by Togo, and some pictures can be found at the RCDB, as well as at our abandoned explorers blogs. Although there were only three Togo Bobsters ever made, one is still operational, at Shirakabo Resort Family Land, also in Japan. These coasters were all manufactured in the early 1980s, and feature a single car with three riders all in a row. If you’re listening and haven’t had a chance to click over to the pictures, think about the Jet Star and Jet Star 2, and that general genre of 1980s retro-futuristic design, and you’ve got the Bobster. The front of the car almost looks like a face with a big oval mouth and two lights for eyes.

The Bobster remained waiting for riders to the very end, with a spare car parked on a side track, and two cars left waiting at the station, exposed to the elements, cushions faded and peeling. In the abandoned state, the grasses and small pines grew up around and through the Bobster track, leading to some incredibly eerie photos. Images: image one / image two / image three.

Jet Coaster Adventure Coaster at Takakonuma Greenland

Up the hill was the bigger coaster, and this is the more iconic one in our abandoned knowledge. It was called by two names on official park signage, both Jet Coaster and Adventure Coaster. It featured a white track and red cars with three white stars painted on the fronts. The RCDB suggests that this was a “non-looping” version of a Meisho Amusement Company coaster.

Most indications are that this coaster was installed in 1982 when the park was renovated.

This coaster looks particularly thrilling in photos, especially in the often-foggy environments of the Date hillside. The track itself doesn’t seem to have been particularly exciting, but with the coaster up on a hillside, the track itself is particularly elevated, adding an extra thrill element, as well.

And in particular contrast to the claims about the lack of imagery of the park in operation, we have video of this ride in operation: a 1990 compilation video which primarily shows the roller coaster from a variety of different angles, including an on-ride view. Guests can be seen queueing for the ride along the entire length of the lift hill. The park was certainly built in a different time period, safety-wise, as there is nothing but a short stretch of 3’ chain-link fence separating curious guests from the first drop on the coaster. The ride itself seems fairly tame, without significant drops or airtime, and the coaster seems to go quite slowly. Take a look at a less-often seen image: sunset over the coaster.

In its abandoned state, this coaster is one of the primary stars of the park. The rails are incredibly rusted after only five years of abandonment, which must speak to how poorly the coaster was maintained to begin with. Reddish orange streaks drip over the entire structure, like an ominous icing.

Ferris Wheel at Takakonuma Greenland

Finally, up at the top of the hill, past the Bobster and the Adventure Coaster, sat the Ferris wheel. I love the look of this wheel, with round cars dangling like teardrops from the circular frame. All of the urbex photographers have oodles of photos of the wheel.

By the time of our photographers’ visits some five years after the ride last spun, vines and other climbing plants had overtaken the wheel, climbing up the support poles and wrapping around the lower gondolas. Kuke states that the manufacturer of the wheel is “ Toyonaga Sangyo”, apparently the same maker of the wheel at the abandoned “Koga Family Land” park in Japan, which we’ll get to someday. (Image of the manufacturer’s plate: http://www.uer.ca/locations/viewgal.asp?picid=89239)

The wheel is small, reportedly only 25 meters in diameter, but it’s incredibly charming looking. A nicely-kept version of the wheel still operates today at Kamine Park in Hitachi.

Missing Rides at Takakonuma Greenland

Of course, as I mentioned, certain rides were shuttered before the park itself closed. We’ve already mentioned a few of these – the Looper and the Enterprise both had their names scraped from the park map. Other things, like a picnic area and a places where kids could ride motorized cars like those you might find at a mall, were also scratched off the map.

Labeled but rarely seen is the “ducks”, number 5 on the park map, and across from it, the flying elephants, number 4 on the map. The map image for the ducks appears to be children riding in a dog. Kuke saw a pile of rubble in this spot, including a sign showing a goldfish and a turtle. I’ll include a link to the image – if you can read Japanese, take a look at the sign on the front of the booth and see what you can make of it. Kuke also comments that the other spot, for the flying elephants, was just grass and concrete at the time of his visit. It’s possible that the common translation of “ducks” is incorrect; a different site calls it “Dachs”, as in dachshund, which would make much more sense with the image of children riding on a dog. Image of an unknown set of parts: http://www.uer.ca/locations/viewgal.asp?picid=182731

Urban explorers report a concrete slide down the side of the hill, which has not been labeled on the map. Perhaps this was a part of the children’s outdoor picnic area?

If you watched the video of the park’s operation, you can also see an impressive Viking boat, this one themed to a dragon theme with two ferocious heads. This was marked on the map but not visible in any urbex images, so this ride was likely sold. 

And up beyond the haunted house, there was once an outdoor petting zoo, said to have featured reindeer and bunny rabbits. This too was scraped off the sign, indicating an early closure. Kuke photographs an unknown building which may be restrooms or related to the zoo operations. Again, with the castle theme. 

It seems that the resource-heavy rides requiring staff manpower were closed early, to save staff hours and to make some money back when the writing was already on the wall (the enterprise and the Viking boat). 

Of course, in its abandoned years, the park was memorialized not only by urban explorers, but in a few pieces of media, including a music video (the opening theme for the “Freedom” OVA which plays the the song “This Is Love” by singer Utada Hikaru), a videogame called Siren 2 which was not released in the US, and the already-mentioned Kamen Rider 555.

Demolition of Takakonuma Greenland

Rumors about the demolition of the park abound. The creepypasta describes a still-extant park looming out of the fog in 2007. Other sources even claim the park stuck around through 2010 or beyond prior to demolition. 

But this is all hearsay and rumor.

What we actually know is from another photographer, user historicist on Flickr. They photographed a partially demolished Ferris wheel on January 20, 2007. Not only that, but they also include an image of an excavator, beginning to demolish another ride, artistically in front of the partially disassembled wheel, taken on January 22, 2007. Their comment: “By the next day the whole park had been demolished.”

After it had all been scrapped, the park sat empty and lifeless for the better part of another decade. Users who download the desktop version of Google Maps can use the time feature to see the land back through 2010 – empty concrete circles, torn zig-zags in the earth. Urban explorers describe very little left but park benches, concrete curbs, and this eerie frog-shaped abandoned sign for the Jet Coaster.

In 2014, work began on the site anew. Soon after, and still to this day, the former site of the Takakonuma Greenland Amusement Park is now covered in solar panels, gleaming shiny and silver in the rare sun.

The source of some of the modern rumors is the single abandoned urbex video we’ve got, a shaky, snow-covered, pixelated video of the rusty Adventure Coaster. The more popular version of the video is actually a repost, claiming that the posting date of the video supports a still-extant park in 2014. However, it’s a repost. The original video clarifies that this is a video from an urbex in 2003. Here’s a link to the original video. I recommend you click through – it’s fantastic and eerie to see the rusty coaster and theme park environs in greater detail, especially in the strange snowy environment. 

Legend of Takakonuma Greenland

The legend of Takakonuma Greenland still persists today. 

People often write of deaths at the park, though there’s no clear available factual information to this point. There are stories of suicides, of people thrown off the roller coasters, of couples dying together. They all seem to stem from English-speaking top ten lists about abandoned and haunted places, with each site trying to top what other sites had written. Every Japanese site writing about the park almost seems politely mystified by the park’s popularity, greater in the absence of the park than it ever was in life.

There’s no evidence for any foul play or bloodshed at the park.

But still, the legends persist. Ghostly voices heard near the site of the former coaster, ghosts said to be seen by the former haunted house. Strange feelings in the head after visiting the park. 

Perhaps it’s that original creepypasta story which seeds the English-speaking perception of the park. Perhaps it’s the relative lack of photos and videos. I think a lot of it lies in the language barrier, where all the fond remembrances from visitors to the park are in Japanese. (Not only fond remembrances, of course – I’ve seen people complaining about the small size of the park, the amount of insects, and the way people got injured on the Chain Tower swings.) And until recently, not a lot of pictures of the park were easily available to find.

Those that are common show a desolate park, ravaged by the elements. They bring to mind thoughts of the world without people, that eternal imbalancing feeling that abandoned theme park images inspire. This was once a place of laughter and fun, a bustling spot of activity. But abandoned, it’s eerie, empty, rusting into pieces, overgrown with nature.

Whatever it is, this park continues to be one of the parks that is most popular when people are searching for abandoned theme parks, despite the relative lack of concrete information about the place. 

Everyone, after all, loves a good spooky story story, especially around Halloween. 

After all, when you’ve looked at these Takakonuma Greenland pictures, did you see a ghostly figure of a girl in a white dress, peeking out of the fog? 

Are you sure?

Remember that what you’ve read is a podcast! A link is included at the top of the page. Listen to more episodes of The Abandoned Carousel on your favorite platform: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Spotify | RadioPublic | TuneIn | Overcast | Pocket Casts | Castro. Support the podcast on Patreon for extra content! Comment below to share your thoughts – as Lucy Maud Montgomery once said, nothing is ever really lost to us, as long as we remember it.

Thanks and References

This week, I’d like to recommend the original photographers to you. I’ll put the links in the reference section of the shownotes, but I’ll call them out here as well. Many of my references are in Japanese, so please use the auto-translate function of your browser (like Google Chrome).

The 2004 visit of Kuke: http://www5f.biglobe.ne.jp/~punch-ht/haikyo/h042009.html 

Jens’ visit in 2006: https://www.flickr.com/photos/jensofjapan/albums/72157625053218600 and his blog post about the visit: http://jensofjapan.blogspot.com/2006/11/takakonuma-green-land.html; and his video containing even more still images: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0M-PnUmhRiA

And the images of user historicist on Flickr, in late 2006 and early 2007: https://www.flickr.com/photos/historicist/albums/72157594493640319/with/182581308/

You might also check the multiple galleries at uer.ca: http://www.uer.ca/locations/show.asp?locid=22541

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50. Takakonuma Greenland-Fukushima City Chat Board |. https://bakusai.com/thr_res/acode=2/ctgid=104/bid=1829/tid=1932632/. Accessed August 24, 2019.
51. Takakonuma Greenland-ruins search map. https://haikyo.info/s/524.html. Accessed August 24, 2019.
52. Takakonuma Greenland-Wikipedia. http://web.archive.org/web/20170217075048/https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E9%AB%98%E5%AD%90%E6%B2%BC%E3%82%B0%E3%83%AA%E3%83%BC%E3%83%B3%E3%83%A9%E3%83%B3%E3%83%89. Published February 17, 2017. Accessed October 5, 2019.
53. thatspicegirl: Abandoned rides at “Takakanonuma Greenland”…. Abandoned and Forgotten. August 2011. https://abandoned.blogberth.com/2011/08/05/thatspicegirlabandoned-rides-at-takakanonuma-greenland/. Accessed August 23, 2019.
54. Hashi. The Creepy, and Abandoned, Amusement Parks of Japan. Tofugu. https://www.tofugu.com/japan/japanese-abandoned-amusemnet-parks/. Published August 17, 2011. Accessed August 23, 2019.
55. T子沼グリーンランドその9. http://www5f.biglobe.ne.jp/~punch-ht/haikyo/h042009.html. Accessed October 9, 2019.
56. What Is Creepypasta? https://www.dailydot.com/culture/definitive-guide-creepypasta-slender-man/. Accessed October 2, 2019.
57. What is happening at Takakonuma Greenland? | Blog to write if you are interested. http://www.kenko48.info/2017/07/11/%e9%ab%98%e5%ad%90%e6%b2%bc%e3%82%b0%e3%83%aa%e3%83%bc%e3%83%b3%e3%83%a9%e3%83%b3%e3%83%89%e3%81%af%e7%8f%be%e5%9c%a8%e3%81%a9%e3%81%86%e3%81%aa%e3%81%a3%e3%81%a6%e3%82%8b%e3%81%ae%ef%bc%9f/. Accessed October 2, 2019.
58. どらやき on Twitter: “すごーく近所にあった、高子沼グリーンランドっていう遊園地の話を聞きました。 閉園してからの廃墟っぷりがすごくて、検索する手が止まるレベル･･･ https://t.co/mp8jvRsZ6A” / Twitter. Twitter. https://twitter.com/dorarararayaki/status/801794010213847040. Accessed August 24, 2019.
59. 三隅俊也. 三流廃墟動画6　[高子沼グリーンランド].; 2014. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ac4LQfP580M&feature=youtu.be&fbclid=IwAR02pwiVjJLFgUEl5GB4_QHhMrETlr63ZPLCgxKR4CLrKURneGcCrzI_h_U. Accessed August 24, 2019.
60. 之 裕 之 on Twitter: “Takakonuma Greenland in Fukushima, famous as an abandoned amusement park. Even if a solar panel is installed, the ground will collapse due to rainwater and the new solar panel will be abandoned. Since it will become, please note → https://t.co/vrTcT29iyZ https://t.co/b9nuioanmp “/ Twitter. Twitter. https://twitter.com/electricdaddy/status/851555677344378881. Accessed August 24, 2019.
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64. 海外でも有名!? 廃墟・高子沼グリーンランドがめちゃめちゃ怖い・・・. NAVER まとめ. https://matome.naver.jp/odai/2139899947228872201. Accessed August 24, 2019.
65. 福島県北部-伊達市-高子沼-その1-2016年4月上旬. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r58zs4I2A1Y. Accessed October 8, 2019.
66. 福島県民にとって想い出の映像集. 気ままにブログ三昧. http://musoujin.cocolog-nifty.com/blog/2018/09/post-2a5d.html. Accessed August 24, 2019.
67. 芝公園公太郎（ポートレートと廃墟を撮る人・ドローンフォトグラファー） on Twitter: “フィルムカメラの時代に出会った「甲賀ファミリーランド」「高子沼グリーンランド」で見た景色は死ぬまで忘れないと思います。 https://t.co/TiGgp9oGAp” / Twitter. Twitter. https://twitter.com/ruinsds/status/940222725905268741. Accessed August 24, 2019.
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Map of Takakonuma Greenland with Key

1. Ferris wheel (観覧車)
2. Jet Coaster / Adventure Coaster (アドベンチャーコースター)
3. Bobster (ボブスター)
4. “Flink Elephant” (Flying Elephants) (フラインクエレフアント)
5. “Ducks” or “Dachs” (クックス)
6. Go Kart (ゴーカート)
7. Sky Cycle (スカイサイクル)
8. Game corner (ゲームコーナー)
9. Twin dragon (swing)
10. (house? Shops or snacks?)(caption unclear)
11. (enterprise)(no caption)
12. (looper)(no caption)
13. (information booth)(unclear)
14. (gate)
15. Merry-go-round (メリーゴーランド)
16. SL (train)
17. Chain Tower (チェーンタワー)
18. “Little child open space” (ちびっこ広場 (電動遊貝))
19. (Haunted house and later insect museum)(no caption)
20. Picnic Square (ピクニック広場)
21. (outdoor play area) (no caption)
22. (deer and rabbit garden) (no caption)

A video of still photos from the park’s operation: https://youtu.be/PRLrAvDPjiE

This episode might be called Americans are dumb or lazy, honestly.

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