With four days off last week and no money nor energy I stayed local rather than going overseas. The holiday began last Tuesday with a trip to Tobu Dobutsukoen (Tobu Zoological Park) with my girlfriend. Less than an hour away from where I live, this place combines three popular day-trip activities all into one.

As it wasn’t a public holiday the place was unbelievably deserted save for a few mothers with their children and the usual tarty girls who never cease to amaze me by wearing high heels with their swimming bikinis. It would be deemed very tarty back home but they can get away with it here for it’s considered cute not that I’m gonna complain as this seemingly endless supply of flesh is one of the best things about living in Tokyo! I digress though!

The Tobu Super Pool was far from being super but was pleasant enough with a wave machine and a short-but-okay rapids-style slide which you descend on a huge inflatable ring designed for two people.

The zoo part came next and we saw flamingos, horses, kangaroos, crocodiles, monkeys (I’m a little bored of monkeys now having seen them in the Philippines, Thailand and Malaysia already this year!), camels, bison, lesser panda, owls, penguins, a solitary fox (it’s somewhere behind me!) and some firefly house spectacle which wasn’t so interesting.

The ride highlights included Regina which is the wooden roller-coaster construction built amidst a nice water setting. This ride really did bring a new meaning to the word headache as we were really jolted around for the duration of the three minute ride which is actually quite long by roller-coaster standards. It still didn’t stop me going on again albeit by myself and this time I was the only one on the ride!

Kawasemi is the recently opened roller-coaster and was great fun with a drop at the start which had a gradient less than 70 degrees. It was full of twists and had a loop and a great speed sensation during the one minute ride.